"I am going away," she declared.

"I haven't offended you?" he begged. "Please sit down. We haven't half talked over things yet."

"We have talked too much," she answered. "I don't know really what has come over me that I have let you—that I listen to you—"

"It is because you feel the truth of what I say," he insisted. "Don't get up, Fedora. Don't go away, dear. Let us have at least these few minutes together. I'll do exactly as you tell me. I'll come to your father or I'll carry you off. I have a sister here. She'll be your friend—"

"Don't!" the girl stopped him. "Please don't!"

She sat down in her chair again. Her fingers were twisted together, her slim form was tense with stifled emotions.

"Have I been a brute?" he asked softly. "You must forgive me, Fedora. I am not much used to girls and I am sort of carried away myself, only I want you to believe that there's the real thing in my heart. I'll make you just as happy as a woman can be. Don't shake your head, dear. I want you to trust me and believe in me."

"I think you're a most extraordinary person," she said at last. "Do you know, I'm beginning to be really afraid of you."

"You're not," he insisted. "You're afraid of yourself. You're afraid because you see the downfall of the old ideas. You're afraid because you know that you're going to be a renegade. You can see nothing but trouble ahead just now. I'll take you right away from that."

There was the rustle of skirts, a soft little laugh. Richard rose to his feet promptly. He had never been so pleased in all his life to welcome his sister.

"Flossie," he exclaimed, "I'm ever so glad you came along! I want to present Miss Grex to you. This is my sister, Miss Fedora—Lady Weybourne. I was just going to ask Miss Grex to have some tea with me," he went on, "but I am not sure that she would have considered it proper. Do come along and be chaperone."

Lady Weybourne laughed.

"I shall be delighted," she declared. "I have seen you here once or twice before, haven't I, Miss Grex, and some one told me that you were Russian. I suppose you are not in the least used to the free and easy ways of us Westerners, but you'll come and have some tea with us, won't you?"

The girl hesitated. Fate was too strong for her.

"I shall be very pleased," she agreed.

They found a window table and Lane ordered tea. Fedora was inclined to be silent at first, but Lady Weybourne was quite content to chatter. By degrees Fedora, too, came back to earth and they had a very gay little tea-party. At the end of it they all strolled back into the rooms together. Fedora glanced at the watch upon her wrist and held out her hand to Lady Weybourne.

"I am sorry," she said, "but I must hurry away now. It is very kind of you to ask me to come and see you, Lady Weybourne. I shall be charmed."

Richard ignored her fingers.

"I am going to see you down to your car, if I may," he begged.

They left the room together. She looked at him as they descended the stairs, almost tremulously.

"This doesn't mean, you know," she said, "that I—that I agree to all you have been saying."

"It needn't mean anything at all, dear," he replied. "This is only the beginning. I don't expect you to realise all that I have realised quite so quickly, but I do want you to keep it in your mind that this thing has come and that it can't be got rid of. I won't do anything foolish. If it is necessary I will wait, but I am your lover now, as I always must be."

He handed her into the car, the footman, in his long white livery, standing somberly on one side. As they drove off she gave him her fingers, and he walked back up the steps with the smile upon his lips that comes to a man only once or twice in his lifetime.



CHAPTER XXVII

PLAYING FOR HIGH STAKES

Violet glanced at her watch with an exclamation of dismayed annoyance. She leaned appealingly towards the croupier.

"But one coup more, monsieur," she pleaded. "Indeed your clock is fast."

The croupier shook his head. He was a man of gallantry so far as his profession permitted, and he was a great admirer of the beautiful Englishwoman, but the rules of the Club were strict.

"Madame," he pointed out, "it is already five minutes past eight. It is absolutely prohibited that we start another coup after eight o'clock. If madame will return at ten o'clock, the good fortune will without doubt be hers."

She looked up at Draconmeyer, who was standing at her elbow.

"Did you ever know anything more hatefully provoking!" she complained. "For two hours the luck has been dead against me. But for a few of my carres turning up, I don't know what would have happened. And now at last my numbers arrive. I win en plein and with all the carres and chevaux. This time it was twenty-seven. I win two carres and I move to twenty, and he will not go on."

"It is the rule," Draconmeyer reminded her. "It is bad fortune, though. I have been watching the run of the table. Things have been coming more your way all the time. I think that the end of your ill-luck has arrived. Tell me, are you hungry?"

"Not in the least," she answered pettishly. "I hate the very thought of dinner."

"Then why do we not go on to the Casino?" Draconmeyer suggested. "We can have a sandwich and a glass of wine there, and you can continue your vein."

She rose to her feet with alacrity. Her face was beaming.

"My friend," she exclaimed, "you are inspired! It is a brilliant idea. I know that it will bring me fortune. To the Cercle Prive, by all means. I am so glad that you are one of those men who are not dependent upon dinner. But what about Linda?"

"She is not expecting me, as it happens," Draconmeyer lied smoothly. "I told her that I might be dining at the Villa Mimosa. I have to be there later on."

Violet gathered up her money, stuffed it into her gold bag and hurried off for her cloak. She reappeared in a few moments and smiled very graciously at Draconmeyer.

"It is quite a wonderful idea of yours, this," she declared. "I am looking forward immensely to my next few coups. I feel in a winning vein. Very soon," she added, as they stepped out on to the pavement and she gathered up her skirts, "very soon I am quite sure that I shall be asking you for my cheques back again."

He laughed, as though she had been a child speaking of playthings.

"I am not sure that I shall wish you luck," he said. "I think that I like to feel that you are a little—just a very little in my debt. Do you think that I should be a severe creditor?"

Something in his voice disturbed her vaguely, but she brushed the thought away. Of course he admired her, but then every woman must have admirers. It only remained for her to be clever enough to keep him at arm's length. She had no fear for herself.

"I haven't thought about the matter at all," she answered carelessly, "but to me all creditors would be the same, whether they were kind or unkind. I hate the feeling of owing anything."

"It is a question," he observed, "how far one can be said to owe anything to those who are really friends. A husband, for instance. One can't keep a ledger account with him."

"A husband is a different matter altogether," she asserted coldly. "Now I wonder whether we shall find my favourite table full. Anyhow, I am going to play at the one nearest the entrance on the right-hand side. There is a little croupier there whom I like."

They passed up through the entrance and across the floor of the first suite of rooms to the Cercle Prive. Violet looked eagerly towards the table of which she had spoken. To her joy there was plenty of room.

"My favourite seat is empty!" she exclaimed. "I know that I am going to be lucky."

"I think that I shall play myself, for a change," Draconmeyer announced, producing a great roll of notes.

"Whenever you feel that you would like to go down and have something, don't mind me, will you?" she begged. "You can come back and talk to me at any time. I am not in the least hungry yet."

"Very well," he agreed. "Good luck to you!" They played at opposite sides of the table. For an hour she won and he lost. Once she called him over to her side.

"I scarcely dare to tell you," she whispered, her eyes gleaming, "but I have won back the first thousand pounds. I shall give it to you to-night. Here, take it now."

He shook his head and waved it away. "I haven't the cheques with me," he protested. "Besides, it is bad luck to part with any of your winnings while you are still playing."

He watched her for a minute or two. She still won.

"Take my advice," he said earnestly. "Play higher. You have had a most unusual run of bad luck. The tide has turned. Make the most of it. I have lost ten mille. I am going to have a try your side of the table."

He found a vacant chair a few places lower down, and commenced playing in maximums. From the moment of his arrival he began to win, and simultaneously Violet began to lose. Her good-fortune deserted her absolutely, and for the first time she showed signs of losing her self-control. She gave vent to little exclamations of disgust as stake after stake was swept away. Her eyes were much too bright, there was a spot of colour in her cheeks. She spoke angrily to a croupier who delayed handing her some change. Draconmeyer, although he knew perfectly well what was happening, never seemed to glance in her direction. He played with absolute recklessness for half-an-hour. When at last he rose from his seat and joined her, his hands were full of notes. He smiled ever so faintly as he saw the covetous gleam in her eyes.

"I'm nearly broken," she gasped. "Leave off playing, please, for a little time. You've changed my luck."

He obeyed, standing behind her chair. Three more coups she played and lost. Then she thrust her hand into her bag and drew it out, empty. She was suddenly pale.

"I have lost my last louis," she declared. "I don't understand it. It seemed as though I must win here."

"So you will in time," he assured her confidently. "How much will you have—ten mille or twenty?"

She shrank back, but the sight of the notes in his hand fascinated her. She glanced up at him. His pallor was unchanged, there was no sign of exultation in his face. Only his eyes seemed a little brighter than usual beneath his gold-rimmed spectacles.

"No, give me ten," she said.

She took them from his hand and changed them quickly into plaques. Her first coup was partially successful. He leaned closer over her.

"Remember," he pointed out, "that you only need to win once in a dozen times and you do well. Don't be in such a hurry."

"Of course," she murmured. "Of course! One forgets that. It is all a matter of capital."

He strolled away to another table. When he came back, she was sitting idle in her place, restless and excited, but still full of confidence.

"I am a little to the good," she told him, "but I have left off for a few minutes. The very low numbers are turning up and they are no use to me."

"Come and have that sandwich," he begged. "You really ought to take something."

"The place shall be kept for madame," the croupier whispered. "I shall be here for another two hours."

She nodded and rose. They made their way out of the Rooms and down into the restaurant on the ground-floor. They found a little table near the wall and he ordered some pate sandwiches and champagne. Whilst they waited she counted up her money, making calculations on a slip of paper. Draconmeyer leaned back in his chair, watching her. His back was towards the door and they were at the end table. He permitted himself the luxury of looking at her almost greedily; of dropping, for a few moments, the mask which he placed always upon his features in her presence. In his way the man was an artist, a great collector of pictures and bronzes, a real lover and seeker after perfection. Often he found himself wandering towards his little gallery, content to stand about and gloat over some of his most treasured possessions. Yet the man's personality clashed often with his artistic pretensions. He scarcely ever found himself amongst his belongings without realising the existence of a curious feeling, wholly removed from the pure artistic pleasure of their contemplation. It was the sense of ownership which thrilled him. Something of the same sensation was upon him now. She was the sort of woman he had craved for always—slim, elegant, and what to him, with his quick powers of observation, counted for so much, she was modish, reflecting in her presence, her dress and carriage, even her speech, the best type of the prevailing fashion. She excited comment wherever she appeared. People, as he knew very well even now, were envying him his companion. And beneath it all—she, the woman, was there. All his life he had fought for the big things—political power, immense wealth, the confidence of his great master—all these had come to him easily. And at that moment they were like baubles!

She looked up at last and there was a slight frown upon her forehead.

"I am still a little down, starting from where I had the ten mille," she sighed. "I thought—"

She stopped short. There was a curious change in her face. Her eyes were fixed upon some person approaching. Draconmeyer turned quickly in his chair. Almost as he did so, Hunterleys paused before their table. Violet looked up at him with quivering lips. For a moment it seemed as though she were stepping out of her sordid surroundings.

"Henry!" she exclaimed. "Did you come to look for me? Did you know that we were here?"

"How should I?" he answered calmly. "I was strolling around with David Briston. We are at the Opera."

"At the Opera," she repeated.

"My little protegee, Felicia Roche, is singing," he went on, "in Aida. If she does as well in the next act as she has done in this, her future is made."

He was on the point of adding the news of Felicia's engagement to the young man who had momentarily deserted him. Some evil chance changed his intention.

"Why do you call her your little protegee?" she demanded.

"It isn't quite correct, is it?" he answered, a little absently. "There are three or four of us who are doing what we can to look after her. Her father was a prominent member of the Wigwam Club. The girl won the musical scholarship we have there. She has more than repaid us for our trouble, I am glad to say."

"I have no doubt that she has," Violet replied, lifting her eyes.

There was a moment's silence. The significance of her words was entirely lost upon Hunterleys.

"Isn't this rather a new departure of yours?" he asked, glancing disdainfully towards Draconmeyer. "I thought that you so much preferred to play at the Club."

"So I do," she assented, "but I was just beginning to win when the Club closed at eight o'clock, and so we came on here."

"Your good fortune continues, I hope?"

"It varies," she answered hurriedly, "but it will come, I am sure. I have been very near a big win more than once."

He seemed on the point of departure. She leaned a little forward.

"You had my note, Henry?"

Her tone was almost beseeching. Draconmeyer, who was listening with stony face, shivered imperceptibly.

"Thank you, yes," Hunterleys replied, frowning slightly. "I am sorry, but I am not at liberty to do what you suggest just at present. I wish you good fortune."

He turned around and walked back to the other end of the room, where Briston was standing at the bar. She looked after him for a moment as though she failed to understand his words. Then her face hardened. Draconmeyer leaned towards her.

"Shall we go?" he suggested.

She rose with alacrity. Side by side they strolled through the rooms towards the Cercle Prive.

"I am sorry," Draconmeyer said regretfully, "but I am forced to leave you now. I will take you back to your place and after that I must go to the hotel and change. I have a reception to attend. I wish you would take the rest of my winnings and see what you can do with them."

She shook her head vigorously.

"No, thank you," she declared. "I have enough."

He shrugged his shoulders.

"I have twenty-five mille here in my pocket," he continued, "besides some smaller change. I don't think it is quite fair to leave so much money about in one's room or to carry it out into the country. Keep it for me. You won't need to play with it—I can see that your luck is in—but it always gives one confidence to feel that one has a reserve stock, something to fall back upon if necessary."

He drew the notes from his pocket and held them towards her. Her eyes were fixed upon them covetously. The thought of all that money actually in her possession was wildly exhilarating.

"I will take care of them for you, if you like," she said. "I shall not play with them, though. I owe you quite enough already and my losing days are over."

He stuffed the notes carelessly into her bag.

"Twenty-five mille," he told her. "Remember my advice. If the luck stays with you, stake maximums. Go for the big things."

She looked at him curiously as she closed her gold bag with a snap.

"After all," she declared, with a little laugh, "I am not sure that you are not the greater gambler of the two to trust me with all this money!"



CHAPTER XXVIII

TO THE VILLA MIMOSA

With feet that seemed to touch nothing more substantial than air, her eyes brilliant, a wonderful colour in her cheeks, Violet passed through the heavy, dingy rooms and out through the motley crowd into the portico of the Casino. She was right! She knew that she had been right! How wise she had been to borrow that money from Mr. Draconmeyer instead of sitting down and confessing herself vanquished! The last few hours had been hours of ecstatic happiness. With calm confidence she had sat in her place and watched her numbers coming up with marvellous persistence. It was the most wonderful thing in the world, this. She had had no time to count her winnings, but at least she knew that she could pay back every penny she owed. Her little gold satchel was stuffed with notes and plaques. She felt suddenly younger, curiously light-hearted; hungry, too, and thirsty. She was, in short, experiencing almost a delirium of pleasure. And just then, on the steps of the Casino, she came face to face with her husband.

"Henry!" she called out. "Henry!"

He turned abruptly around. He was looking troubled, and in his hand were the fragments of a crushed up note.

"Come across to the hotel with me," she begged, forgetful of everything except her own immense relief. "Come and help me count. I have been winning. I have won back everything."

He accepted the information with only a polite show of interest. After all, as she reflected afterwards, he had no idea upon what scale she had been gambling!

"I am delighted to hear it," he answered. "I'll see you across the road, if I may, but I have only a few minutes to spare. I have an appointment."

She was acutely disappointed; unreasonably, furiously angry.

"An appointment!" she exclaimed. "At half-past eleven o'clock at night! Are you waiting for Felicia Roche?"

"Is there any reason why I should not?" he asked her gravely.

She bit her lips hard. They were crossing the road now. After all, it was only a few months since she had bidden him go his own way and leave her to regulate her own friendships.

"No reason at all," she admitted, "only I cannot see why you choose to advertise yourself with an opera singer—you, an ambitious politician, who moves with his head in the clouds, and to whom women are no more than a pastime. Why have you waited all these years to commence a flirtation under my very nose!"

He looked at her sternly.

"I think that you are a little excited, Violet," he said. "You surely don't realise what you are saying."

"Excited! Tell me once more—you got my note, the one I wrote this evening?"

"Certainly."

His brief reply was convincing. She remembered the few impulsive lines which she had written from her heart in that moment of glad relief. There was no sign in his face that he had been touched. Even at that moment he had drawn out his watch and was looking at it.

"Thank you for bringing me here," she said, as they stood upon the steps of the hotel. "Don't let me keep you."

"After all," he decided, "I think that I shall go up to my room for a minute. Good night!"

She looked after him, a little amazed. She was conscious of a feeling of slow anger. His aloofness repelled her, was utterly inexplicable. For once it was she who was being badly treated. Her moment of exhilaration had passed. She sat down in the lounge; her satchel, filled with mille franc notes, lay upon her lap unheeded. She sat there thinking, seeing nothing of the crowds of fashionably dressed women and men passing in and out of the hotel; of the gaily-lit square outside, the cool green of the gardens, the cafe opposite, the brilliantly-lit Casino. She was back again for a moment in England. The strain of all this life, whipped into an artificial froth of pleasure by the constant excitement of the one accepted vice of the world, had suddenly lost its hold upon her. The inevitable question had presented itself. She was counting values and realising....

When at last she rose wearily to her feet, Hunterleys was passing through the hall of the hotel, on his way out. She looked at him with aching heart but she made no effort to stop him. He had changed his clothes for a dark suit and he was also wearing a long travelling coat and tweed cap. She watched him wistfully until he had disappeared. Then she turned away, summoned the lift and went up to her rooms. She rang at once for her maid. She would take a bath, she decided, and go to bed early. She would wash all the dust of these places away from her, abjure all manner of excitement and for once sleep peacefully. In the morning she would see Henry once more. Deep in her heart there still lingered some faint shadow of doubt as to Draconmeyer and his attitude towards her. It was scarcely possible that he could have interfered in any way, and yet.... She would talk to her husband face to face, she would tell him the things that were in her heart.

She rang the bell for the second time. Only the femme de chambre answered the summons. Madame's maid was not to be found. Madame had not once retired so early. It was possible that Susanne had gone out. Could she be of any service? Violet looked at her and hesitated. The woman was clumsy-fingered and none too tidy. She shook her head and sent her away. For a moment she thought of undressing herself. Then instead she opened her satchel and counted the notes. Her breath came more quickly as she looked at the shower of gold and counted the many oblong strips of paper with their magic lettering. At last she had it all in heaps. There were the twenty-five mille he had left with her, and the seventy-five mille she had borrowed from him. Then towards her own losses there was another mille, and a matter of five hundred francs in gold. And all this success, her wonderful recovery, had been done so easily! It was just because she had had the pluck to go on, because she had followed her vein. She looked at the money and she walked to the window. Somewhere a band was playing in the distance. Little parties of men and women in evening dress were strolling by on their way to the Club. A woman was laughing as she clung to her escort on the opposite side of the road, by the gardens. Across at the Cafe de Paris the people were going in to supper. The spirit of enjoyment seemed to be in the air—the light-hearted, fascinating, devil-may-care atmosphere she knew so well. Violet looked back into the bedroom and she no longer had the impulse to sleep. Her face had hardened a little. Every one was so happy and she was so lonely. She stuffed the notes and gold back into her bag, looked at her hat in the glass and touched her face for a moment with a powder-puff. Then she left the room, rang for the lift and descended.

"I am going into the Club for an hour or so, if I am wanted," she told the concierge as she passed out.

* * * * *

Hunterleys, on leaving the hotel, walked rapidly across the square and found David waiting for him on the opposite side.

"Felicia will be late," the latter explained. "She has to get all that beastly black stuff off her face. She is horribly nervous about Sidney and she doesn't want you to wait. I think perhaps she is right, too. She told me to tell you that Monsieur Lafont himself came to her room and congratulated her after the curtain had gone down. She is almost hysterical between happiness and anxiety about Sidney. Where's your man?"

"I asked him to be a little higher up," Hunterleys replied. "There he is."

They walked a few steps up the hill and found Richard Lane waiting for them in his car. The long, grey racer looked almost like some submarine monster, with its flaring head-lights and torpedo-shaped body which scarcely cleared the ground.

"Ready for orders, sir," the young man announced, touching his cap.

"Is there room for three of us, in case of an emergency?" Hunterleys asked.

"The third man has to sit on the floor," Richard pointed out, "but it isn't so comfortable as it looks."

Hunterleys clambered in and took the vacant place. David Briston lingered by a little wistfully.

"I feel rather a skunk," he grumbled. "I don't see why I shouldn't come along."

Hunterleys shook his head.

"There isn't the slightest need for it," he declared firmly. "You go back and look after Felicia. Tell her we'll get Sidney out of this all right. Get away with you, Lane, now."

"Where to?"

"To the Villa Mimosa!"

Richard whistled as he thrust in his clutch.

"So that's the game, is it?" he murmured, as they glided off.

Hunterleys leaned towards him.

"Lane," he said, "don't forget that I warned you there might be a little trouble about to-night. If you feel the slightest hesitation about involving yourself—"

"Shut up!" Richard interrupted. "Whatever trouble you're ready to face, I'm all for it, too. Darned queer thing that we should be going to the Villa Mimosa, though! I am not exactly a popular person with Mr. Grex, I think."

Hunterleys smiled.

"I saw your sister this afternoon," he remarked. "You are rather a wonderful young man."

"I knew it was all up with me," Richard replied simply, "when I first saw that girl. Now look here, Hunterleys, we are almost there. Tell me exactly what it is you want me to do?"

"I want you," Hunterleys explained, "to risk a smash, if you don't mind. I want you to run up to the boundaries of the villa gardens, head your car back for Monte Carlo, and while you are waiting there turn out all your lights."

"That's easy enough," Richard assented. "I'll turn out the search-light altogether, and my others are electric, worked by a button. Is this an elopement act or what?"

"There's a meeting going on in that villa," Hunterleys told him, "between prominent politicians of three countries. You don't have to bother much about Secret Service over in the States, although there's more goes on than you know of in that direction. But over here we have to make regular use of Secret Service men—spies, if you like to call them so. The meeting to-night is inimical to England. It is part of a conspiracy against which I am working. Sidney Roche—Felicia Roche's brother—who lives here as a newspaper correspondent, is in reality one of our best Secret Service men. He is taking terrible chances to-night to learn a little more about the plans which these fellows are discussing. We are here in case he needs our help to get away. We've cleared the shrubs away, close to the spot at which I am going to ask you to wait, and taken the spikes off the fence. It's just a thousand to one chance that if he's hard pressed for it and heads this way, they may think that they have him in a trap and take it quietly. That is to say, they'll wait to capture him instead of shooting."

"Say, you don't mean this seriously?" Richard exclaimed. "They can't do more than arrest him as a trespasser, or something of that sort, surely?"

Hunterleys laughed grimly.

"These men wouldn't stick at much," he told his companion. "They're hand in glove with the authorities here. Anything they did would be hushed up in the name of the law. These things are never allowed to come out. It doesn't do any one any good to have them gossiped about. If they caught Sidney and shot him, we should never make a protest. It's all part of the game, you know. Now that is the spot I want you to stop at, exactly where the mimosa tree leans over the path. But first of all, I'd turn out your head-light."

They slowed down and stopped. Richard extinguished the acetylene gas-lamp and mounted again to his place. Then he swung the car round and crawled back upon the reverse until he reached the spot to which Hunterleys had pointed.

"You're a good fellow, Richard," Hunterleys said softly. "We may have to wait an hour or two, and it may be that nothing will happen, but it's giving the fellow a chance, and it gives him confidence, too, to know that friends are at hand."

"I'm in the game for all it's worth, anyway," Lane declared heartily.

He touched a button and the lights faded away. The two men sat in silence, both turned a little in their seats towards the villa.



CHAPTER XXIX

FOR HIS COUNTRY

The minutes glided by as the two men sat together in the perfumed, shadowy darkness. From their feet the glittering canopy of lights swept upwards to the mountain-sides, even to the stars, but a chain of slowly drifting black clouds hung down in front of the moon, and until their eyes became accustomed to their surroundings it seemed to both of them as though they were sitting in a very pit of darkness.

"It is possible," Hunterleys whispered, after some time, "that we may have to wait for another hour yet."

Richard was suddenly tense. He sat up, and his foot reached for the self-starter.

"I don't think you will," he muttered. "Listen!"

Almost immediately they were conscious of some commotion in the direction of the villa, followed by a shot and then a cry.

"Start the engine," Hunterleys directed hoarsely, standing up in his place. "I'm afraid they've got him."

There were two more shots but no further cry. Then they heard the sound of excited voices and immediately afterwards rapidly approaching footsteps. A man came crashing through the shrubbery, but when he reached the fence over which, for a moment, his white face gleamed, he sank down as though powerless to climb. Hunterleys leapt to the ground and rushed to the fence.

"Hold up, Sidney, old fellow," he called softly. "We're here all right. Hold up for a moment and let me lift you."

Roche struggled to his feet. His face was ghastly white, the sweat stood out upon his forehead, his lips moved but no words came. Hunterleys got him by the arms, set his teeth and lifted. The task would have been too much for him, but Richard, springing from the car, came to his help. With an effort they hoisted him over the fence. Almost as they did so there was the sound of footsteps dashing through the shrubs, and a shot, the bullet of which tore the bark from the trunk of a tree close at hand. The car leapt off in fourth speed, Sidney supported in Hunterleys' arms. A loud shout from behind only brought Richard's foot down upon the accelerator.

"Stoop low!" he cried to Hunterleys. "Get your legs in, if you can."

A bullet struck the back of the car and another whistled over their heads. Then they dashed around the corner, and Richard, turning on the lights, jammed down his accelerator.

"Gee whiz! that's a bloodthirsty crew!" the young man exclaimed, his eyes fixed upon the road. "Is he hurt?"

Roche was lying back on the seat. Hunterleys was on his knees, holding on to the framework of the car.

"They've got me all right, Hunterleys," Roche faltered. "Listen. Everything went well with me at first. I could hear—nearly everything. The Frenchman kept his mouth shut—tight as wax. Grex did most of the talking. Russia sees nothing in the entente—England has nothing to offer her. She'd rather keep friends with Germany. Russia wants to move eastward—all Persia—India. She's only lukewarm, any way, about the French alliance as things stand at present, and dead off any truck with England. There's talk of Constantinople, and Germany to march three army corps through a weak French resistance to Calais. They talked of France acting to her pledges, putting her recruits in the front, taking a slight defeat, making a peace on her own account, with Alsace and Lorraine restored. She can pay. Germany wants the money. Germany—Germany—"

The words died away in a little groan. The wounded man's head fell back. Hunterleys passed his arm around the limp figure.

"Take the first turn to the right and second to the left, Richard," he directed. "We'll drive straight to the hospital. I made friends with the English doctor last night. He promised to be there till three. I paid him a fee on purpose."

"First to the right," Richard muttered, swinging around. "Second to the left, eh?"

Hunterleys was holding his brandy flask to Roche's lips as they swung through the white gates and pulled up outside the hospital. The doctor was faithful to his promise, and Roche, who was now unconscious, was carried in. In the hall he was laid upon an ambulance and borne off by two attendants. Hunterleys and Lane sat down to wait in the hall. After what seemed to them an interminable half-hour, the doctor reappeared. He came over to them at once.

"Your friend may live," he announced, "but in any case he will be unconscious for the next twenty-four hours. There is no need for you to stay, or for you to fetch the young lady you spoke of, at present. If he dies, he will die unconscious. I can tell you nothing more until the afternoon."

Hunterleys rose slowly to his feet.

"You'll do everything you can, doctor?" he begged. "Money doesn't count."

"Money never counts here," the doctor replied gravely. "We shall save him if it is possible. You've nothing to tell me, I suppose, as to how he met with his wound?"

"Nothing."

They walked out together into the night. The bank of clouds had drifted away now and the moon was shining. Below them, barely a quarter of a mile away, they could see the flare of lights from the Casino. A woman was laughing hysterically through the open windows of a house on the other side of the way. Some one was playing a violin in a cafe at the corner of the street.

"Richard," Hunterleys said, "will you see me through? I have to get to Cannes as fast as I can to send a cable. I daren't send it from here, even in code."

"I'll drive you to Cannes like a shot," Richard assented heartily. "Just a brandy and soda on our way out, and I'll show you some pretty driving."

They stopped at the Cafe de Paris and left the car under the trees. Both men took a long drink and Richard filled his pocket with cigarettes. Then they re-entered the car, lit up, and glided off on the road for Cannes. Richard had become more serious. His boyish manner and appearance had temporarily gone. He drove, even, with less than his usual recklessness.

"That was a fine fellow," he remarked enthusiastically, after a long pause, "that fellow Roche!"

"And we've many more like him," Hunterleys declared. "We've men in every part of the world doing what seems like dirty work, ill-paid work, too, doing it partly, perhaps, because the excitement grows on them and they love it, but always, they have to start in cold blood. The papers don't always tell the truth, you know. There's many a death in foreign cities you read of as a suicide, or the result of an accident, when it's really the sacrifice of a hero for his country. It's great work, Richard."

"Makes me feel kind of ashamed," Richard muttered. "I've never done anything but play around all my life. Anyway, those sort of things don't come to us in our country. America's too powerful and too isolated to need help of that description. We shouldn't have any use for politicians of your class, or for Secret Service men."

"If you're in earnest," Hunterleys advised, "you go to Washington and ask them about it some day. The time's coming, if it hasn't already arrived, when your country will have to develop a different class of politicians. You see, whether she wants it or not, she is coming into touch, through Asia and South America, with European interests, and if she does, she'll have to adopt their methods more or less. Poor old Roche! There was something more he wanted to say, and if it's what I've been expecting, your country was in it."

"I guess I'll take Fedora over for our honeymoon," Richard decided softly. "Don't see why I shouldn't come into one of the Embassies. I'm a bit of a hulk to go about the world doing nothing."

Hunterleys laughed quietly.

"My young friend," he said, "aren't you taking your marriage prospects a little for granted? May I be there when you ask Augustus Nicholas Ivan Peter, Grand Duke of Vassura, Prince of Melinkoff, cousin of His Imperial Majesty the Czar, for the hand of his daughter in marriage!"

"So that's it, is it?" Lane murmured. "Why didn't you tell me before?"

Hunterleys shook his head. He gazed steadfastly along the road in front of him.

"It wasn't to my interest to have it known too generally," he said, "and I am afraid your little love affair didn't strike me as being of much importance by the side of the other things. But you've earned the truth, if it's any use to you."

"Well," Richard observed, "I wasn't counting on having any witnesses, but you can come along if you like. I suppose," he added, "I shall have to do him the courtesy of asking his permission, but—"

"But what?" Hunterleys asked curiously.

They were on a long stretch of straight, white road. Richard looked for a moment up to the sky, and Hunterleys, watching him, was amazed at the transformation.

"There isn't a Grand Duke or a Prince or an Imperial Majesty alive," he said, "who could rob me of Fedora!"



CHAPTER XXX

"SUPPOSING I TAKE THIS MONEY"

There was a momentary commotion in the Club. A woman had fainted at one of the roulette tables. Her chair was quickly drawn back. She was helped out to the open space at the top of the stairs and placed in an easy-chair there. Lady Weybourne, who was on the point of leaving with her husband, hastened back. She stood there while the usual restoratives were being administered, fanning the unconscious woman with a white ostrich fan which hung from her waist. Presently Violet opened her eyes. She recognised Lady Weybourne and smiled weakly.

"I am so sorry," she murmured. "It was silly of me to stay in here so long. I went without my dinner, too, which was rather idiotic."

A man who had announced himself a doctor, bent over her pulse and turned away.

"The lady will be quite all right now," he said. "You can give her brandy and soda if she feels like it. Pardon!"

He hastened back to his place at the baccarat table. Lady Hunterleys sat up.

"It was quite absurd of me," she declared. "I don't know what—"

She stopped suddenly. The weight was once more upon her heart, the blankness before her eyes. She remembered!

"I am quite able to go home now," she added.

Her gold bag lay upon her lap. It was almost empty. She looked at it vacantly and then closed the snap.

"We'll see you back to the hotel," Lady Weybourne said soothingly. "Here comes Harry with the brandy and soda."

Lord Weybourne came hurrying from the bar, a tumbler in his hand.

"How nice of you!" Violet exclaimed gratefully. "Really, I feel that this is just what I need. I wonder what time it is?"

"Half past four," Lord Weybourne announced, glancing at his watch.

She laughed weakly.

"How stupid of me! I have been between here and the Casino for nearly twelve hours, and had nothing to eat. No, I won't have anything here, thanks," she added, as Lord Weybourne started back again for the bar, muttering something about a sandwich. "I'll have something in my room. If you are going back to the hotel, perhaps I could come with you."

They all three left the place together, passing along the private way.

"I haven't seen your brother all day," Violet remarked to Lady Weybourne.

"Richard's gone off somewhere in the car to-night, a most mysterious expedition," his sister declared. "I began to think that it must be an elopement, but I see the yacht's there still, and he would surely choose the yacht in preference to a motor-car, if he were running off with anybody! Your husband doesn't come into the rooms much?"

Violet shook her head.

"He hasn't the gambling instinct," she said quietly. "Perhaps he is just as well without it. One gets a lot of amusement out of this playing for small stakes, but it is irritating to lose. Thank you so much for looking after me," she added, as they reached the hall of the hotel. "I am quite all right now and my woman will be sitting up for me."

She passed into the lift. Lady Weybourne looked after her admiringly.

"Say, she's got some pluck, Harry!" she murmured. "They say she lost nearly a hundred mille to-night and she never even mentioned her losings. Irritating, indeed! I wonder what Sir Henry thinks of it. They are only moderately well off."

Her husband shrugged his shoulders, after the fashion of his sex.

"Let us hope," he said, "that it is Sir Henry who suffers."

* * * * *

Violet slipped out of her gown and dismissed her maid. In her dressing-gown she sat before the open window. Everywhere the place seemed steeped in the faint violet and purple light preceding the dawn. Away eastwards she could catch a glimpse of the mountains, their peaks cut sharply against the soft, deep sky; a crystalline glow, the first herald of the hidden sunrise, hanging about their summits. The gentle breeze from the Mediterranean was cool and sweet. There were many lights still gleaming upon the sea, but their effect now seemed tawdry. She sat there, her head resting upon her hands. She had the feeling of being somehow detached from the whole world of visible objects, as though, indeed, she were on her death-bed. Surely it was not possible to pass any further through life than this! In her thoughts she went back to the first days of estrangement between her husband and herself. Almost before she realised it, she found herself struggling against the tenderness which still survived, which seemed at that moment to be tearing at her heart-strings. He had ceased to care, she told herself. It was all too apparent that he had ceased to care. He was amusing himself elsewhere. Her little impulsive note had not won even a kind word from him. Her appeals, on one excuse or another, had been disregarded. She had lost her place in his life, thrown it away, she told herself bitterly. And in its stead—what! A new fear of Draconmeyer was stealing over her. He presented himself suddenly as an evil genius. She went back through the last few days. Her brain seemed unexpectedly clear, her perceptions unerring. She saw with hateful distinctness how he had forced this money upon her, how he had encouraged her all the time to play beyond her means. She realised the cunning with which he had left that last bundle of notes in her keeping. Well, there the facts were. She owed him now four thousand pounds. She had no money of her own, she was already overdrawn with her allowance. There was no chance of paying him. She realised, with a little shudder, that he did not want payment, a realisation which had come to her dimly from the first, but which she had pushed away simply because she had felt sure of winning. Now there was the price to be paid! She leaned further out of the window. Away to her left the glow over the mountains was becoming stained with the faintest of pinks. She looked at it long, with mute and critical appreciation. She swept with her eyes the line of violet shadows from the mountain-tops to the sea-board, where the pale lights of Bordighera still flickered. She looked up again from the dark blue sea to the paling stars. It was all wonderful—theatrical, perhaps, but wonderful—and how she hated it! She stood up before the window and with her clenched fists she beat against the sills. Those long days and feverish nights through which she had passed slowly unfolded themselves. In those few moments she seemed to taste again the dull pain of constant disappointment, the hectic thrills of occasional winnings, the strange, dull inertia which had taken the place of resignation. She looked into the street below. How long would she live afterwards, she wondered, if she threw herself down! She began even to realise the state of mind which breeds suicides, the brooding over a morrow too hateful to be faced.

As she still stood there, the silence of the street below was broken. A motor-car swung round the corner and swept past the side of the hotel. She caught at the curtain as she recognised its occupants. Richard Lane was driving, and by his side sat her husband. The car was covered with dust, both men seemed weary as though they had been out all night. She gazed after them with fast-beating heart. She had pictured her husband at the villa on the hill! Where had he been with Richard Lane? Perhaps, after all, the things which she had imagined were not true. The car had stopped now at the front door. It returned a moment later on its way to the garage, with only Lane driving. She opened her door and stood there silently. Hunterleys would have to pass the end of the corridor if he came up by the main lift. She waited with fast beating heart. The seconds passed. Then she heard the rattle of the lift ascending, its click as it stopped, and soon afterwards the footsteps of a man. He was coming—coming past the corner! At that moment she felt that the sound of his footsteps was like the beating of fate. They came nearer and she shrank a little back. There was something unfamiliar about them. Whoever it might be, it was not Henry! And then suddenly Draconmeyer came into sight. He saw her standing there and stopped short. Then he came rapidly near.

"Lady Hunterleys!" he exclaimed softly. "You still up?"

She hesitated. Then she stood on one side, still grasping the handle of the door.

"Do you want to come in?" she asked. "You may. I have something to say to you. Perhaps I shall sleep better if I say it now."

He stepped quickly past her.

"Close the door," he whispered cautiously.

She obeyed him deliberately.

"There is no hurry," she said. "This is my sitting-room. I receive whom I choose here."

"But it is nearly six o'clock!" he exclaimed.

"That does not affect me," she answered, shrugging her shoulders. "Sit down."

He obeyed. There was something changed about her, something which he did not recognise. She thrust her hands into a box of cigarettes, took one out and lit it. She leaned against the table, facing him.

"Listen," she continued, "I have borrowed from you three thousand pounds. You left with me to-night—I don't know whether you meant to lend it to me or whether I had it on trust, but you left it in my charge—another thousand pounds. I have lost it all—all, you understand—the four thousand pounds and every penny I have of my own."

He sat quite still. He was watching her through his gold-rimmed spectacles. There was the slightest possible frown upon his forehead. The time for talking of money as though it were a trifle had passed.

"That is a great deal," he said.

"It is a great deal," she admitted. "I owe it to you and I cannot pay. What are you going to do?"

He watched her eagerly. There was a new note in her voice. He paused to consider what it might mean. A single false step now and he might lose all that he had striven for.

"How am I to answer that?" he asked softly. "I will answer it first in the way that seems most natural. I will beg you to accept your losings as a little gift from me—as a proof, if you will, of my friendship."

He had saved the situation. If he had obeyed his first impulse, the affair would have been finished. He realised it as he watched her face, and he shuddered at the thought of his escape. His words obviously disturbed her.

"It is not possible for me," she protested, "to accept money from you."

"Not from Linda's husband?"

She threw her cigarette into the grate and stood looking at him.

"Do you offer it to me as Linda's husband?" she demanded.

It was a crisis for which Draconmeyer was scarcely prepared. He was driven out of his pusillanimous compromise. She was pressing him hard for the truth. Again the fear of losing her altogether terrified him.

"If I have other feelings of which I have not spoken," he said quietly, "have I not kept them to myself? Do I obtrude them upon you even now? I am content to wait."

"To wait for what?" she insisted.

All that had been in his mind seemed suddenly miraged before him—the removal of Hunterleys, his own wife's failing health. The way had seemed so clear only a little time ago, and now the clouds were back again.

"Until you appreciate the fact," he told her, "that you have no more sincere friend, that there is no one who values your happiness more than I do."

"Supposing I take this money from you," she asked, after a moment's pause. "Are there any conditions?"

"None whatever," he answered.

She turned away with a little sigh. The tragedy which a few minutes ago she had seen looming up, eluded her. She had courted a denouement in vain. He was too clever.

"You are very generous," she said. "We will speak of this to-morrow. I called you in because I could not bear the uncertainty of it all. Please go now."

He rose slowly to his feet. She gave him her hand lifelessly. He kept it for a moment. She drew it away and looked at the place where his lips had touched it, wonderingly. It was as though her fingers had been scorched with fire.

"It shall be to-morrow," he whispered, as he passed out.



CHAPTER XXXI

NEARING A CRISIS

From the wilds of Scotland to Monte Carlo, as fast as motor-cars and train de luxe could bring him, came the right Honourable Meredith Simpson, a very distinguished member of His Majesty's Government. Hunterleys, advised of his coming by telegram from Marseilles, met him at the station, and together the two men made their way at once to Hunterleys' room across at the Hotel de Paris. Behind locked doors they spoke for the first time of important matters.

"It's a great find, this of yours, Hunterleys," the Minister acknowledged, "and it is corroborated, too, by what we know is happening around us. We have had all the warning in the world just lately. The Russian Ambassador is in St. Petersburg on leave of absence—in fact for the last six months he has been taking his duties remarkably lightly. Tell me how you first heard of the affair?"

"I got wind of it in Sofia," Hunterleys explained. "I travelled from there quite quietly, loitered about the Italian Riviera, and came on here as a tourist. The only help I could get hold of here was from Sidney Roche, who, as you know, is one of our Secret Service men. Roche, I am sorry to say, was shot last night. He may live but he won't be well enough to take any further hand in the game here, and I have no one to take his place."

"Roche shot!" Mr. Simpson exclaimed, in a shocked tone. "How did it happen?"

"They found him lying on the roof of the Villa Mimosa, just over the room where the meeting was taking place," Hunterleys replied. "They chased him round the grounds and we just got him off in a motor-car, but not before he'd been hit twice. He was just able to tell me a little. The first meeting was quite informal and very guarded. Douaille was most cautious—he was there only to listen. The second meeting was last night. Grex was in the chair, representing Russia."

"You mean the Grand Duke Augustus?" Mr. Simpson interrupted.

Hunterleys nodded.

"Grex is the name he is living under here. He explained Russia's position. Poor Roche was only able to falter a few words, but what he said was enough to give us the key-note to the whole thing. The long and short of it all is that Russia turned her face westward so long as Constantinople was possible. Now that this war has come about and ended as it has done, Russia's chance has gone. There is no longer any quid pro quo for her alliance with France. There is no friendship, of course, between Russia and Germany, but at any rate Russia has nothing to fear from Germany, and she knows it. Grex is quite frank. They must look eastward, he said, and when he says eastward, he means Manchuria, China, Persia, even India. At the same time, Russia has a conscience, even though it be a diplomatic conscience. Hence this conference. She doesn't want France crushed. Germany has a proposition. It has been enunciated up to a certain point. She confers Alsace and Lorraine and possibly Egypt upon France, for her neutrality whilst she destroys the British Fleet. Or failing her neutrality, she wants her to place a weak army on the frontier, which can fall back without much loss before a German advance. Germany's objective then will be Calais and not Paris, and from there she will command the Straits and deal with the British Fleet at her leisure. Meanwhile, she will conclude peace with France on highly advantageous terms. Don't you see what it means, Simpson? The elementary part of the thing is as simple as A B C. Germany has nothing to gain from Russia, she has nothing to gain from France. England is the only country who can give her what she wants. That is about as far as they have got, up to now, but there is something further behind it all. That, Selingman is to tell them to-night."

"The most important point about the whole matter, so far as we are concerned," Mr. Simpson declared, "is Douaille's attitude. You have received no indication of that, I suppose?"

"None whatever," Hunterleys answered. "I thought of paying my respects, but after all, you know, I have no official standing, and personally we are almost strangers."

The Minister nodded.

"It's a difficult position," he confessed. "Have you copies of your reports to London?"

"I have copies of them, and full notes of everything that has transpired so far, in a strong box up at the bank," Hunterleys assented. "We can stroll up there after lunch and I will place all the documents in your hands. You can look them through then and decide what is best to be done."

The Minister rose to his feet.

"I shall go round to my rooms, change my clothes," he announced, "and meet you presently. We'll lunch across at Ciro's, eh? I didn't mean to come to Monte Carlo this year, but so long as I am here, I may as well make the best of it. You are not looking as though the change had done you much good, Hunterleys."

"The last few days," Hunterleys remarked, a little drily, "have not been exactly in the nature of a holiday."

"Are you here alone?"

"I came alone. I found my wife here by accident. She came through with the Draconmeyers. They were supposed to stay at Cannes, but altered their plans. Of course, Draconmeyer meant to come here all the time."

The Minister frowned.

"Draconmeyer's one man I should be glad to see out of London," he declared. "Under the pretext of fostering good-will, and that sort of thing, between the mercantile classes of our two countries, I think that that fellow has done about as much mischief as it is possible for any single man to have accomplished. We'll meet in an hour, Hunterleys. My man is putting out some things for me and I must have a bath."

Hunterleys walked up to the hospital, and to his surprise met Selingman coming away. The latter saluted him with a wave of the hat and a genial smile.

"Calling to see our poor invalid?" he enquired blandly.

Hunterleys, although he knew his man, was a little taken aback.

"What share in him do you claim?" he asked.

Selingman sighed.

"Alas!" he confessed, "I fear that my claim would sound a little cold-blooded. I think that I was the only man who held his gun straight. Yet, after all, Roche would be the last to bear me any grudge. He was playing the game, taking his risks. Uncommonly bad marksmen Grex's private police were, or he'd be in the morgue instead of the hospital."

"I gather that our friend is still alive?" Hunterleys remarked.

"Going on as well as could be expected," Selingman replied.

"Conscious?"

Selingman smiled.

"You see through my little visit of sympathy at once!" he exclaimed. "Unable to converse, I am assured, and unable to share with his friends any little information he may have picked up last night. By the way, whom shall you send to report our little conference to-night? You wouldn't care to come yourself, would you?"

"I should like to exceedingly," Hunterleys assured him, "if you'd give me a safe conduct."

Selingman withdrew his cigar from his mouth and laid his hand upon the other's shoulder.

"My dear friend," he said earnestly, "your safe conduct, if ever I signed it, would be to the other world. Frankly, we find you rather a nuisance. We would be better pleased if your Party were in office, and you with your knees tucked under a desk at Downing Street, attending to your official business in your official place. Who gave you this roving commission, eh? Who sent you to talk common sense to the Balkan States, and how the mischief did you get wind of our little meeting here?"

"Ah!" Hunterleys replied, "I expect you really know all these things."

Selingman, with his feet planted firmly upon the pavement, took a fresh cigar from his waistcoat pocket, bit off the end and lit it.

"My friend Hunterleys," he continued, "I am enjoying this brief interchange of confidences. Circumstances have made me, as you see, a politician, a schemer if you like. Nature meant me to be one of the frankest, the most truthful, the best-hearted of men. I detest the tortuous ways of the old diplomacy. The spoken word pleases me best. That is why I like a few minutes' conversation with the enemy, why I love to stand here and talk to you with the buttons off our foils. We are scheming against you and your country, and you know it, and we shall win. We can't help but win—if not to-day, to-morrow. Your country has had a marvellously long run of good luck, but it can't last for ever."

Hunterleys smiled.

"Well," he observed, "there's nothing like confidence. If you are so sure of success, why couldn't you choose a cleaner way to it than by tampering with our ally?"

Selingman patted his companion on the shoulder.

"Listen, my friend," he said, "there are no such things as allies. An alliance between two countries is a dead letter so soon as their interests cease to be identical. Now Austria is our ally because she is practically Germany. We are both mid-Continental Powers. We both need the same protection. But England and France! Go back only fifty years, my dear Hunterleys, and ask yourself—would any living person, living now and alive then, believe in the lasting nature of such an unnatural alliance? Wherever you look, in every quarter of the globe, your interests are opposed. You robbed France of Egypt. She can't have wholly forgotten. You dominate the Mediterranean through Gibraltar, Malta, and Cyprus. What does she think of that, I wonder? Isn't a humiliation for her when she does stop to think of it? You've a thousand years of quarrels, of fighting and rapine behind you. You can't call yourselves allies because the thing isn't natural. It never could be. It was only your mutual, hysterical fear of Germany which drove you into one another's arms. We fought France once to prove ourselves, and for money. Just now we don't want either money or territory from France. Perhaps we don't even want, my dear Englishman, what you think we want, but all the same, don't blame us for trying to dissolve an unnatural alliance. Was that Simpson who came by the Luxe this morning?"

"It was," Hunterleys admitted.

"The Right Honourable John William Meredith Simpson!" Selingman recited, waving his cigar. "Well, well, we certainly have made a stir with our little meetings here. An inspired English Cabinet Minister, travel-stained and dusty, arrives with his valet and a black dispatch-box, to foil our schemes. Send him along, my friend. We are not at all afraid of Mr. Simpson. Perhaps we may even ask him to join us this evening."

"I fancy," Hunterleys remarked grimly, "that the Englishman who joins you this evening will find a home up on the hill here."

"Or down in the morgue there," Selingman grunted, pointing down to Monaco. "Take care, Hunterleys—take care, man. One of us hates you. It isn't I. You are fighting a brave fight and a losing fight, but you are good metal. Try and remember, when you find that you are beaten, that life has many consolations for the philosopher."

He passed on and Hunterleys entered the hospital. Whilst he was waiting in the little reception-room, Felicia came in. Her face showed signs of her night's anxiety.

"Sidney is still unconscious," she announced, her voice shaking a little. "The doctors seem hopeful—but oh! Sir Henry, it is terrible to see him lying there just as though he were dead!"

"Sidney will pull through all right," Hunterleys declared, encouragingly. "He has a wonderful constitution and he is the luckiest fellow born. He always gets out of trouble, somehow or other."

She came slowly up to him.

"Sir Henry," she said piteously, "I know quite well that Sidney was willing to take his risks. He went into this thing, knowing it was dangerous. I want to be brave. What happens must be. But listen. You won't—you won't rob me of everything in life, will you? You won't send David after him?"

Hunterleys smiled reassuringly.

"I can promise you that," he told her. "This isn't David's job at all. He has to stick to his post and help out the bluff as a press correspondent. Don't be afraid, Felicia. You shall have your David."

She seized his hand and kissed it.

"You have been so kind to me always, Sir Henry," she sighed. "I can't tell you how thankful I am to think that you don't want David to go and run these horrible risks."

"No fear of that, I promise you," he assured her once more. "David will be busy enough pulling the strings another way."

The doctor entered the room and shook hands with Hunterleys. There was no news, he declared, nothing to be done. The patient must continue in his present condition for several more hours at least. The symptoms were, in their way, favourable. Beyond that, nothing could be said. Felicia and Hunterleys left the hospital together.

"I wonder," she began, as they turned out of the white gates, "whether you would mind very much if I told you something?"

"Of course not!"

"Yesterday," she continued slowly, "I met Lady Hunterleys. You know, I have seen her twice when I have been to your house to sing for your guests. She recognised me, I feel sure, but she didn't seem to want to see me. She looked surprised when I bowed. I worried about it at first and then I wondered. You are so very, very secretive just now. Whatever this affair may be in which you three are all concerned, you never open your lips about it. Lady Hunterleys probably doesn't know that you have had to come up to the villa at all hours of the night just to see Sidney. You don't suppose that by any chance she imagined—that you came to see me?"

Hunterleys was struck by the thought. He remembered several chance remarks of his wife. He remembered, too, the coincidence of his recent visits to the villa having prevented him in each case from acceding to some request of Violet's.

"I am glad you've mentioned this, child," he said frankly. "Now I come to think of it, my wife certainly did know that I came up to the villa very late one night, and she seemed upset about it. Of course, she hasn't the faintest idea about your brother."

"Well," Felicia declared, with a sigh of relief, "I felt that I had to tell you. It sounded horribly conceited, in a way, but then she wouldn't know that you came to see Sidney, or that I was engaged to David. Misunderstandings do come about so easily, you know, sometimes."

"This one shall be put right, at any rate," he promised her. "Now, if you will take my advice, you will go home and lie down until the evening. You are going to sing again, aren't you?"

"If there is no change," she replied. "I know that he would like me to. You haven't minded—what I've said?"

"Not a bit, child," he assured her; "in fact I think it was very good of you. Now I'll put you in this carriage and send you home. Think of nothing except that Sidney is getting better every hour, and sing to-night as though your voice could reach his bedside. Au revoir!"

He waved his hand to her as she drove off, and returned to the Hotel de Paris. He found a refreshed and rejuvenated Simpson smoking a cigarette upon the steps.

"To lunch!" the latter exclaimed. "Afterwards I will tell you my plans."



CHAPTER XXXII

AN INTERESTING MEETING

Hunterleys leaned suddenly forward across the little round table.

"The question of whether or no you shall pay your respects to Monsieur Douaille," he remarked, "is solved. Unless I am very much mistaken, we are going to have an exceedingly interesting luncheon-party on our right."

"Monsieur Douaille——" Mr. Simpson began, a little eagerly.

"And the others," Hunterleys interrupted. "Don't look around for a moment. This is almost historical."

Monsieur Ciro himself, bowing and smiling, was ushering a party of guests to a round table upon the terrace, in the immediate vicinity of the two men. Mr. Grex, with his daughter and Lady Hunterleys on one side and Monsieur Douaille on the other, were in the van. Draconmeyer followed with Lady Weybourne, and Selingman brought up the rear with the Comtesse d'Hausson, one of the most prominent leaders of the French colony in Monte Carlo, and a connection by marriage of Monsieur Douaille.



"A luncheon-party for Douaille," Hunterleys murmured, as he bowed, to his wife and exchanged greetings with some of the others. "I wonder what they think of their neighbours! A little embarrassing for the chief guest, I am afraid."

"I see your wife is in the enemy's camp," his companion observed. "Draconmeyer is coming to speak to me. This promises to be interesting."

Draconmeyer and Selingman both came over to greet the English Minister. Selingman's blue eyes were twinkling with humour, his smile was broad and irresistible.

"This should send funds up in every capital of Europe," he declared, as he shook hands. "When Mr. Meredith Simpson takes a holiday, then the political barometer points to 'set fair'!"

"A tribute to my conscientiousness," the Minister replied, smiling. "I am glad to see that I am not the only hard-worked statesman who feels able to take a few days' holiday."

Selingman glanced at the round table and beamed.

"It is true," he admitted. "Every country seems to have sent its statesmen holiday-making. And what a playground, too!" he added, glancing towards Hunterleys with something which was almost a wink. "Here, political crises seem of little account by the side of the turning wheel. This is where the world unbends and it is well that there should be such a place. Shall we see you at the Club or in the rooms later?"

"Without a doubt," Mr. Simpson assented. "For what else does one live in Monte Carlo?"

"How did you leave things in town?" Mr. Draconmeyer enquired.

"So-so!" the Minister answered. "A little flat, but then it is a dull season of the year."

"Markets about the same, I suppose?" Mr. Draconmeyer asked.

"I am afraid," Mr. Simpson confessed, "that I only study the city column from the point of view of what Herr Selingman has just called the political barometer. Things were a little unsteady when I left. Consols fell several points yesterday."

Mr. Draconmeyer frowned.

"It is incomprehensible," he declared. "A few months ago there was real danger, one is forced to believe, of a European war. To-day the crisis is passed, yet the money-markets which bore up so well through the critical period seem now all the time on the point of collapse. It is hard for a banker to know how to operate these days. I wish you gentlemen in Downing Street, Mr. Simpson, would make it easier for us."

Mr. Simpson shrugged his shoulders.

"The real truth of the matter is," he said, "that you allow your money-market to become too sensitive an affair. A whisper will depress it. A threatening word spoken in the Reichstag or in the House of Parliament, magnified a hundred-fold before it reaches its destination, has sometimes a most unwarranted effect upon markets. You mustn't blame us so much, Mr. Draconmeyer. You jump at conclusions too easily in the city."

"Sound common sense," Mr. Draconmeyer agreed. "You are perfectly right when you say that we are over-sensitive. The banker deplores it as much as the politician. It's the money-kings, I suppose, who find it profitable."

They returned to their table a moment later. As he passed Douaille, Selingman whispered in his ear. Monsieur Douaille turned around at once and bowed to Simpson. As he caught the latter's eye he, too, left his place and came across. Mr. Simpson rose to his feet. The two men bowed formally before shaking hands.

"Monsieur Simpson," the Frenchman exclaimed, "it is a pleasure to find that I am remembered!"

"Without a doubt, monsieur," was the prompt reply. "Your last visit to London, on the occasion when we had the pleasure of entertaining you at the Guildhall, is too recent, and was too memorable an event altogether for us to have forgotten. Permit me to assure you that your speech on that occasion was one which no patriotic Englishman is likely to forget."

Monsieur Douaille inclined his head in thanks. His manner was not altogether free from embarrassment.

"I trust that you are enjoying your holiday here?" he asked.

"I have only this moment arrived," Mr. Simpson explained. "I am looking forward to a few days' rest immensely. I trust that I shall have the pleasure of seeing something of you, Monsieur Douaille. A little conversation would be most agreeable."

"In Monte Carlo one meets one's friends all the time," Monsieur Douaille replied. "I lunch to-day with my friend—our mutual friend, without a doubt—who calls himself here Mr. Grex."

Mr. Simpson nodded.

"If it is permitted," he suggested, "I should like to do myself the honour of paying my respects to you."

Monsieur Douaille was flattered.

"My stay here is short," he regretted, "but your visit will be most acceptable. I am at the Riviera Palace Hotel."

"It is one of my theories," Mr. Simpson remarked, "that politicians are at a serious disadvantage compared with business men, inasmuch as, with important affairs under their control, they have few opportunities of meeting those with whom they have dealings. It would be a great pleasure to me to discuss one or two matters with you."

Monsieur Douaille departed, with a few charming words of assent. Simpson looked after him with kindling eyes.

"This," he murmured, leaning across the table, "is a most extraordinary meeting. There they sit, those very men whom you suspect of this devilish scheme, within a few feet of us! Positively thrilling, Hunterleys!"

Hunterleys, too, seemed to feel the stimulating effect of a situation so dramatic. As the meal progressed, he drew his chair a little closer to the table and leaned over towards his companion.

"I think," he said, "that we shall both of us remember the coincidence of this meeting as long as we live. At that luncheon-table, within a few yards of us, sits Russia, the new Russia, raising his head after a thousand years' sleep, watching the times, weighing them, realising his own immeasurable strength, pointing his inevitable finger along the road which the Russia of to-morrow must tread. There isn't a man in that great country so much to be feared to-day, from our point of view, as the Grand Duke Augustus. And look, too, at the same table, within a few feet, Simpson, of you and of me—Selingman, Selingman who represents the real Germany; not the war party alone, intoxicated with the clash of arms, filled with bombastic desires for German triumphs on sea and land, ever ready to spout in flowery and grandiloquent phrases the glory of Germany and the Heaven-sent genius of her leaders. I tell you, Simpson, Selingman is a more dangerous man than that. He sits with folded arms, in realms of thought above these people. He sits with a map of the world before him, and he places his finger upon the inevitable spots which Germany must possess to keep time with the march of the world, to find new homes for her overflowing millions. He has no military fervour, no tinselly patriotism. He knows what Germany needs and he will carve her way towards it. Look at him with his napkin tucked under his chin, broad-visaged, podgy, a slave, you might think, to the joys of the table and the grosser things of life. You should see his eyes sometimes when the right note is struck, watch his mouth when he sits and thinks. He uses words for an ambush and a barricade. He talks often like a gay fool, a flood of empty verbiage streams from his lips, and behind, all the time his brain works."

"You seem to have studied these people, Hunterleys," Simpson remarked appreciatively.

Hunterleys smiled as he continued his luncheon.

"Forgive me if I was a little prolix," he said, "but, after all, what would you have? I am out of office but I remain a servant of my country. My interest is just as keen as though I were in a responsible position."

"You are well out of it," Simpson sighed. "If half what you suspect is true, it's the worst fix we've been in for some time."

"I am afraid there isn't any doubt about it," Hunterleys declared. "Of course, we've been at a fearful disadvantage. Roche was the only man out here upon whom I could rely. Now they've accounted for him, we've scarcely a chance of getting at the truth."

Mr. Simpson was gloomily silent for some moments. He was thinking of the time when he had struck his pencil through a recent Secret Service estimate.

"Anyhow," Hunterleys went on, "it will be all over in twenty-four hours. Something will be decided upon—what, I am afraid there is very little chance of our getting to know. These men will separate—Grex to St. Petersburg, Selingman to Berlin, Douaille to Paris. Then I think we shall begin to hear the mutterings of the storm."

"I think," Mr. Simpson intervened, his eyes fixed upon an approaching figure, "that there is a young lady talking to the maitre d'hotel, who is trying to attract your attention."

Hunterleys turned around in his chair. It was Felicia who was making her way towards him. He rose at once to his feet. There was a little murmur of interest amongst the lunchers as she threaded her way past the tables. It was not often that an English singer in opera had met with so great a success. Lady Hunterleys, recognising her as she passed, paused in the middle of a sentence. Her face hardened. Hunterleys had risen from his place and was watching Felicia's approach anxiously.

"Is there any news of Sidney?" he asked quickly, as he took her hand.

"Nothing fresh," she answered in a low voice. "I have brought you a message—from some one else."

He held his chair for her but she shook her head.

"I mustn't stay," she continued. "This is what I wanted to tell you. As I was crossing the square just now, I recognised the man Frenhofer, from the Villa Mimosa. Directly he saw me he came across the road. He was looking for one of us. He dared not come to the villa, he declares, for fear of being watched. He has something to tell you."

"Where can I find him?" Hunterleys asked.

"He has gone to a little bar in the Rue de Chaussures, the Bar de Montmartre it is called. He is waiting there for you now."

"You must stay and have some lunch," Hunterleys begged. "I will come back."

She shook her head.

"I have just been across to the Opera House," she explained, "to enquire about some properties for to-night. I have had all the lunch I want and I am on my way to the hospital now again. I came here on the chance of finding you. They told me at the Hotel de Paris that you were lunching out."

Hunterleys turned and whispered to Simpson.

"This is very important," he said. "It concerns the affair in which we are interested. Linger over your coffee and I will return."

Mr. Simpson nodded and Hunterleys left the restaurant with Felicia. His wife, at whom he glanced for a moment, kept her head averted. She was whispering in the ear of the gallant Monsieur Douaille. Selingman, catching Draconmeyer's eye, winked at him solemnly.

"You have all the luck, my silent friend," he murmured.



CHAPTER XXXIII

THE FATES ARE KIND

The Bar de Montmartre was many steps under the level of the street, dark, smelly, and dilapidated. Its only occupants were a handful of drivers from the carriage-stand opposite, who stared at Hunterleys in amazement as he entered, and then rushed forward, almost in a body, to offer their services. The man behind the bar, however, who had evidently been forewarned, intervened with a few sharp words, and, lifting the flap of the counter, ushered Hunterleys into a little room beyond. Frenhofer was engaged there in amiable badinage with a young lady who promptly disappeared at Hunterleys' entrance. Frenhofer bowed respectfully.

"I must apologise," he said, "for bringing monsieur to such a place. It is near the end now, and with Monsieur Roche in the hospital I ventured to address myself to monsieur direct. Here I have the right to enter. I make my suit to the daughter of the proprietor in order to have a safe rendezvous when necessary. It is well that monsieur has come quickly. I have tidings. I can disclose to monsieur the meeting-place for to-night. If monsieur has fortune and the wit to make use of it, the opportunity I shall give him is a great one. But pardon me. Before we talk business we must order something."

He touched the bell. The proprietor himself thrust in his head, bullet-shaped, with black moustache and unshaven chin. He wore no collar, and the remainder of his apparel was negligible.

"A bottle of your best brandy," Frenhofer ordered. "The best, mind, Pere Hanaut."

The man's acquiescence was as amiable as nature would permit.

"Monsieur will excuse me," Frenhofer went on, as the door was once more closed, "but these people have their little ways. To sell a whole bottle of brandy at five times its value, is to Monsieur le Proprietaire more agreeable than to offer him rent for the hire of his room. He is outside all the things in which we are concerned. He believes—pardon me, monsieur—that we are engaged in a little smuggling transaction. Monsieur Roche and I have used this place frequently."

"He can believe what he likes," Hunterleys replied, "so long as he keeps his mouth shut."

The brandy was brought—and three glasses. Frenhofer promptly took the hint and, filling one to the brim, held it out to the landlord.

"You will drink our health, Pere Hanaut—my health and the health of monsieur here, and the health of the fair Annette. Incidentally, you will drink also to the success of the little scheme which monsieur and I are planning."

"In such brandy," the proprietor declared hoarsely, "I would drink to the devil himself!"

He threw back his head and the contents of his glass vanished. He set it down with a little smack of the lips. Once more he looked at the bottle. Frenhofer filled up his glass, but motioned to the door with his head.

"You will excuse us, dear friend," he begged, laying his hand persuasively upon the other's shoulder. "Monsieur and I have little enough of time."

The landlord withdrew. Frenhofer walked around the little apartment. Their privacy was certainly assured.

"Monsieur," he announced, turning to Hunterleys, "there has been a great discussion as to the next meeting-place between our friends—the next, which will be also the last. They are safe enough in reality at the villa, but Monsieur Douaille is nervous. The affair of last night terrified him. The reason for these things I, of course, know nothing of, but it seems that Monsieur Douaille is very anxious indeed to keep his association with my august master and Herr Selingman as secret as possible. He has declined most positively to set foot again within the Villa Mimosa. Many plans have been suggested. This is the one adopted. For some weeks a German down in Monaco, a shipping agent, has had a yacht in the harbour for hire. He has approached Mr. Grex several times, not knowing his identity; ignorant, indeed, of the fact that the Grand Duke himself possesses one of the finest yachts afloat. However, that is nothing. Mr. Grex thought suddenly of the yacht. He suggested it to the others. They were enthusiastic. The yacht is to be hired for a week, or longer if necessary, and used only to-night. Behold the wonderful good-fortune of the affair! It is I who have been selected by my master to proceed to Monaco to make arrangements with the German, Herr Schwann. I am on my way there at the moment."

"A yacht?" Hunterleys repeated.

"There are wonderful things to be thought of," Frenhofer asserted eagerly. "Consider, monsieur! The yacht of this man Schwann has never been seen by my master. Consider, too, that aboard her there must be a dozen hiding-places. The crew has been brought together from anywhere. They can be bought to a man. There is only one point, monsieur, which should be arranged before I enter upon this last and, for me, most troublesome and dangerous enterprise."

"And that?" Hunterleys enquired.

"My own position," Frenhofer declared solemnly. "I am not greedy or covetous. My ambitions have long been fixed. To serve an Imperial Russian nobleman has been no pleasure for me. St. Petersburg has been a prison. I have been moved to the right or to the left as a machine. It is as a machine only I have lived. Always I have longed for Paris. So month by month I have saved. After to-night I must leave my master's employ. The risk will be too great if monsieur indeed accepts my proposition and carries it out. I need but a matter of ten thousand francs to complete my savings."

The man's white face shone eagerly in the dim light of the gloomy little apartment. His eyes glittered. He waited almost breathlessly.

"Frenhofer," Hunterleys said slowly, "so far as I have been concerned indirectly in these negotiations with you, my instructions to my agent have been simple and definite. We have never haggled. Your name was known to me eight years ago, when you served us in St. Petersburg and served us well. You have done the same thing now and you have behaved with rare intelligence. Within the course of an hour I shall transfer ten thousand francs to the account of Francois Frenhofer at the English Bank here."

The eyes of the man seemed suddenly like pinpricks of fire.

"Monsieur is a prince," he murmured. "And now for the further details. If monsieur would run the risk, I would suggest that he accompanies me to the office of this man Schwann."

Hunterleys made no immediate reply. He was walking up and down the narrow apartment. A brilliant idea had taken possession of him. The more he thought of it, the more feasible it became.

"Frenhofer," he said at last, "I have a scheme of my own. You are sure that Mr. Grex has never seen this yacht?"

"He has never set eyes upon it, monsieur, save to try and single it out with his field-glasses from the balcony of the villa."

"And he is to board it to-night?"

"At ten o'clock to-night, monsieur, it is to lie off the Villa Mimosa. A pinnace is to fetch Mr. Grex and his friends on board from the private landing-stage of the Villa Mimosa."

Hunterleys nodded thoughtfully.

"Frenhofer," he explained, "my scheme is this. A friend of mine has a yacht in the harbour. I believe that he would lend it to me. Why should we not substitute it for the yacht your master imagines that he is hiring? If so, all difficulties as to placing whom I desire on board and secreting them are over."

"It is a great scheme," Frenhofer assented, "but supposing my master should choose to telephone some small detail to the office of the man Schwann?"

"You must hire the yacht of Schwann, just as you were instructed," Hunterleys pointed out. "You must give orders, though, that it is not to leave the harbour until telephoned for. Then it will be the yacht which I shall borrow which will lie off the Villa Mimosa to-night."

"It is admirable," Frenhofer declared. "The more one thinks of it, the more one appreciates. This yacht of Schwann's—the Christable, he calls it—was fitted out by a millionaire. My master will be surprised at nothing in the way of luxury."

"Tell me again," Hunterleys asked, "at what hour is it to be off the Villa Mimosa?"

"At ten o'clock," Frenhofer replied. "A pinnace is to be at the landing-stage of the villa at that time. Mr. Grex, Monsieur Douaille, Herr Selingman, and Mr. Draconmeyer will come on board."

"Very good! Now go on your errand to the man Schwann. You had better meet me here later in the afternoon—say at four o'clock—and let me know that all is in order. I will bring you some particulars about my friend's boat, so that you will know how to answer any questions your master may put to you."

"It is admirable," Frenhofer repeated enthusiastically. "Monsieur had better, perhaps, precede me."

Hunterleys walked through the streets back to Ciro's Restaurant, filled with a new exhilaration. His eyes were bright, his brain was working all the time. The luncheon-party at the next table were still in the midst of their meal. Mr. Simpson was smoking a meditative cigarette with his coffee. Hunterleys resumed his place and ordered coffee for himself.

"I have been to see a poor friend who met with an accident last night," he announced, speaking as clearly as possible. "I fear that he is very ill. That was his sister who fetched me away."

Mr. Simpson nodded sympathetically. Their conversation for a few minutes was desultory. Then Hunterleys asked for the bill and rose.

"I will take you round to the Club and get your carte," he suggested. "Afterwards, we can spend the afternoon as you choose."

The two men strolled out of the place. It was not until after they had left the arcade and were actually in the street, that Hunterleys gripped his companion's arm.

"Simpson," he declared, "the fates have been kind to us. Douaille has a fit of the nerves. He will go no more to the Villa Mimosa. Seeking about for the safest meeting-place, Grex has given us a chance. The only one of his servants who belongs to us is commissioned to hire a yacht on which they meet to-night."

"A yacht," Mr. Simpson replied, emptily.

"I have a friend," Hunterleys continued, "an American. I am convinced that he will lend me his yacht, which is lying in the harbour here. We are going to try and exchange. If we succeed, I shall have the run of the boat. The crew will be at our command, and I shall get to that conference myself, somehow or other."

Mr. Simpson felt himself left behind. He could only stare at his companion.

"Tell me, Sir Henry," he begged, almost pathetically, "have I walked into an artificial world? Do you mean to tell me seriously that you, a Member of Parliament, an ex-Minister, are engaged upon a scheme to get the Grand Duke Augustus and Douaille and Selingman on board a yacht, and that you are going to be there, concealed, turned into a spy? I can't keep up with it. As fiction it seems to me to be in the clouds. As truth, why, my understanding turns and mocks me. You are talking fairy-tales."

Hunterleys smiled tolerantly.

"The man in the street knows very little of the real happenings in life," he pronounced. "The truth has a queer way sometimes of spreading itself out into the realms of fiction. Come across here with me to the hotel. I have got to move heaven and earth to find my friend."

"Do with me as you like," Mr. Simpson sighed resignedly. "In a plain political discussion, or an argument with Monsieur Douaille—well, I am ready to bear my part. But this sort of thing lifts me off my feet. I can only trot along at your heels."

They entered the Hotel de Paris. Hunterleys made a few breathless enquiries. Nothing, alas! was known of Mr. Richard Lane. He came back, frowning, to the steps of the hotel.

"If he is up playing golf at La Turbie," Hunterleys muttered, "we shall barely have time."

A reception clerk tapped him on the shoulder. He turned abruptly around.

"I have just made an enquiry of the floor waiter," the clerk announced. "He believes that Mr. Lane is still in his room."

Hunterleys thanked the man and hurried to the lift. In a few moments he was knocking at the door of Lane's rooms. His heart gave a great jump as a familiar voice bade him enter. He stepped inside and closed the door behind him. Richard, in light blue pyjamas, sat up in bed and looked at his visitor with a huge yawn.

"Say, old chap, are you in a hurry or anything?" he demanded.

"Do you know the time?" Hunterleys asked.

"No idea," the other replied. "The valet called me at eight. I told him I'd shoot him if he disturbed me again."

"It's nearly three o'clock!" Hunterleys declared impressively.

"Can't help it," Richard yawned, throwing off the bed-clothes and sitting on the edge of the bed. "I am young and delicate and I need my rest. Seriously, Hunterleys," he added, "you take a chap out and make him drive you at sixty miles an hour all through the night, you keep him at it till nearly six in the morning, and you seem to think it a tragedy to find him in bed at three o'clock in the afternoon. Hang it, I've only had eight hours' sleep!"

"I don't care how long you've had," Hunterleys rejoined. "I am only too thankful to find you. Now listen. Is your brain working? Can you talk seriously?"

"I guess so."

"You remember our talk last night?"

"Every word of it."

"The time has come," Hunterleys continued,—"your time, I mean. You said that if you could take a hand, you'd do it. I am here to beg for your help."

"You needn't waste your breath doing that," Richard answered firmly. "I'm your man. Go on."

"Listen," Hunterleys proceeded. "Is your yacht in commission?"

"Ready to sail at ten minutes' notice," the young man assured him emphatically, "victualled and coaled to the eyelids. To tell you the truth, I have some idea of abducting Fedora to-day or to-morrow."

"You'll have to postpone that," Hunterleys told him. "I want to borrow the yacht."

"She's yours," Richard assented promptly. "I'll give you a note to the captain."

"Look here, I want you to understand this clearly," Hunterleys went on. "If you lend me the Minnehaha, well, you commit yourself a bit. You see, it's like this. I've one man of my own in Grex's household. He came to me this morning. Monsieur Douaille objects to cross again the threshold of the Villa Mimosa. He fears the English newspapers. There has been a long discussion as to the next meeting-place. Grex suggested a yacht. To that they all agreed. There is a man named Schwann down in Monaco has a yacht for hire. Mr. Grex knows about it and he has sent the man I spoke of into Monaco this afternoon to hire it. They are all going to embark at ten o'clock to-night. They are going to hold their meeting in the cabin."

Lane whistled softly. He was wide awake now.

"Go on," he murmured. "Go on. Say, this is great!"

"I want," Hunterleys explained, "your yacht to take the place of the other. I want it to be off the Villa Mimosa at ten o'clock to-night, your pinnace to be at the landing-stage of the villa to bring Mr. Grex and his friends on board. I want you to haul down your American flag, keep your American sailors out of sight, cover up the Stars and Stripes in your cabin, have only your foreign stewards on show. Schwann's yacht is a costly one. No one will know the difference. You must get up now and show me over the boat. I have to scheme, somehow or other, how we can hide ourselves on it so that I can overhear the end of this plot."