The face of Richard Lane was like the face of an ingenuous boy who sees suddenly a Paradise of sport stretched out before him. His mouth was open, his eyes gleaming.

"Gee, but this is glorious!" he exclaimed. "I'm with you all the way. Why, it's wonderful, man! It's a chapter from the Arabian Nights over again!"

He leapt to his feet and rang the bell furiously. Then he rushed to the telephone.

"Blue serge clothes," he ordered the valet. "Get my bath ready."

"Any breakfast, monsieur?"

"Oh, breakfast be hanged! No, wait a moment. Get me some coffee and a roll. I'll take it while I dress. Hurry up!... Yes, is that the enquiry office? This is Mr. Lane. Send round to my chauffeur at the garage at once and tell him that I want the car at the door in a quarter of an hour. Righto! ... Sit down, Hunterleys. Smoke or do whatever you want to. We'll be off to the yacht in no time."

Hunterleys clapped the young giant on the shoulders as he rushed through to the bathroom.

"You're a brick, Richard," he declared. "I'll wait for you down in the hall. I've a pal there."

"I'll be down in twenty minutes or earlier," Lane promised. "What a lark!"



CHAPTER XXXIV

COFFEE FOR ONE ONLY

The breaking up of Mr. Grex's luncheon-party was the signal for a certain amount of man[oe]uvring on the part of one or two of his guests. Monsieur Douaille, for instance, was anxious to remain the escort of Lady Hunterleys, whose plans for the afternoon he had ascertained were unformed. Mr. Grex was anxious to keep apart his daughter and Lady Weybourne, whose relationship to Richard Lane he had only just apprehended; while he himself desired a little quiet conversation with Monsieur Douaille before they paid the visit which had been arranged for to the Club and the Casino. In the end, Mr. Grex was both successful and unsuccessful. He carried off Monsieur Douaille for a short ride in his automobile, but was forced to leave his daughter and Lady Weybourne alone. Draconmeyer, who had been awaiting his opportunity, remained by Lady Hunterleys' side.

"I wonder," he asked, "whether you would step in for a few minutes and see Linda?"

She had been looking at the table where her husband and his companion had been seated. Draconmeyer's voice seemed to bring her back to a present not altogether agreeable.

"I am going back to my room for a little time," she replied. "I will call in and see Linda first, if you like."

They left the restaurant together and strolled across the Square to the Hotel de Paris, ascended in the lift, and made their way to Draconmeyer's suite of rooms in a silence which was almost unbroken. When they entered the large salon with its French-windows and balcony, they found the apartment deserted. Violet looked questioningly at her companion. He closed the door behind him and nodded.

"Yes," he admitted, "my message was a subterfuge. I have sent Linda over to Mentone with her nurse. She will not be back until late in the afternoon. This is the opportunity for which I have been waiting."

She showed no signs of anger or, indeed, disturbance of any sort. She laid her tiny white silk parasol upon the table and glanced at him coolly.

"Well," she said, "you have your way, then. I am here."

Draconmeyer looked at her long and anxiously. Skilled though he was in physiognomy, closely though he had watched, for many months, the lights and shades, the emotional changes in her expression, he was yet, at that moment, completely puzzled. She was not angry. Her attitude seemed to be, in a sense, passive. Yet what did passivity mean? Was it resignation, consent, or was it simply the armour of normal resistance in which she had clothed herself? Was he wise, after all, to risk everything? Then, as he looked at her, as he realised her close and wonderful presence, he suddenly told himself that it was worth while risking even Heaven in the future for the joy of holding her for once in his arms. She had never seemed to him so maddeningly beautiful as at that moment. It was one of the hottest days of the season and she was wearing a gown of white muslin, curiously simple, enhancing, somehow or other, her fascinating slimness, a slimness which had nothing to do with angularity but possessed its own soft and graceful curves. Her eyes were bluer even than her turquoise brooch or the gentians in her hat. And while his heart was aching and throbbing with doubts and hopes, she suddenly smiled at him.

"I am going to sit down," she announced carelessly. "Please say to me just what is in your mind, without reserve. It will be better."

She threw herself into a low chair near the window. Her hands were folded in her lap. Her eyes, for some reason, were fixed upon her wedding ring. Swift to notice even her slightest action, he frowned as he discerned the direction of her gaze.

"Violet," he said, "I think that you are right. I think that the time has come when I must tell you what is in my mind."

She raised her eyebrows slightly at the sound of her Christian name. He moved over and stood by her chair.

"For a good many years," he began slowly, "I have been a man with a purpose. When it first came into my mind—not willingly—its accomplishment seemed utterly hopeless. Still, it was there. Strong man though I am, I could not root it out. I waited. There was nothing else to do but wait. From that moment my life was divided. My whole-soul devotion to worldly affairs was severed. I had one dream that was more wonderful to me, even, than complete success in the great undertaking which brought me to London. That dream was connected with you, Violet."

She moved a little uneasily, as though the repetition of her Christian name grated. This time, however, he was rapt in his subject.

"I won't make excuses," he went on. "You know what Linda is—what she has been for ten years. I have tried to be kind to her. As to love, I never had any. Ours was an alliance between two great monied families, arranged for us, acquiesced in by both of us as a matter of course. It seemed to me in those days the most natural and satisfactory form of marriage. I looked upon myself as others have thought me—a cold, bloodless man of figures and ambition. It is you who have taught me that I have as much sentiment and more than other men, a heart and desires which have made life sometimes hell and sometimes paradise. For two years I have struggled. Life with me has been a sort of passionate compromise. For the joy of seeing you sometimes, of listening to you and watching you, I have borne the agony of having you leave me to take your place with another man. You don't quite know what that meant, and I am not going to tell you, but always I have hoped and hoped."

"And now," she said, looking at him, "I owe you four thousand pounds and you think, perhaps, that your time has come to speak?"

He shivered as though she had struck him a blow.

"You think," he exclaimed, "that I am a man of pounds, shillings, and pence! Is it my fault that you owe me money?"

He snatched her cheques from his inner pocket and ripped them in pieces, lit a match and watched them while they smouldered away. She, too, watched with emotionless face.

"Do you think that I want to buy you?" he demanded. "There! You are free from your money claims. You can leave my room this moment, if you will, and owe me nothing."

She made no movement, yet he was vaguely disturbed by a sense of having made but little progress, a terrible sense of impending failure. His fingers began to tremble, his face was the face of a man stretched upon the rack.

"Perhaps those words of mine were false," he went on. "Perhaps, in a sense, I do want to buy you, buy the little kindnesses that go with affection, buy your kind words, the touch sometimes of your fingers, the pleasant sense of companionship I feel when I am with you. I know how proud you are. I know how virtuous you are. I know that it's there in your blood, the Puritan instinct, the craving for the one man to whom you have given yourself, the involuntary shrinking from the touch of any other. Good women are like that—wives or mistresses. Mind, in a sense it's narrow; in a sense it's splendid. Listen to me. I don't want to declare war against that instinct—yet. I can't. Perhaps, even now, I have spoken too soon, craved too soon for the little I do ask. Yet God knows I can keep the seal upon my lips no longer! Don't let us misunderstand one another for the sake of using plain words. I am not asking you to be my mistress. I ask you, on my knees, to take from me what makes life brighter for you. I ask you for the other things only—for your confidence, for your affection, your companionship. I ask to see you every day that it is possible, to know that you are wearing my gifts, surrounded by my flowers, the rough places in your life made smooth by my efforts. I am your suppliant, Violet. I ask only for the crumbs that fall from your table, so long as no other man sits by your side. Violet, can't you give me as much as this?"

His hand, hot and trembling, sought hers, touched and gripped it. She drew her fingers away. It was curious how in those few moments she seemed to be gifted with an immense clear-sightedness. She knew very well that nothing about the man was honest save the passion of which he did not speak. She rose to her feet.

"Well," she said, "I have listened to you very patiently. If I owe you any excuse for having appeared to encourage any one of those thoughts of which you speak, here it is. I am like thousands of other women. I absolutely don't know until the time comes what sort of a creature I am, how I shall be moved to act under certain circumstances. I tried to think last night. I couldn't. I felt that I had gone half-way. I had taken your money. I had taken it, too, understanding what it means to be in a man's debt. And still I waited. And now I know. I won't even question your sincerity. I won't even suggest that you would not be content with what you ask for—"

"I have sworn it!" he interrupted hoarsely. "To be your favoured friend, to be allowed near you—your guardian, if you will—"

The words failed him. Something in her face checked his eloquence.

"I can tell you this now and for always," she continued. "I have nothing to give you. What you ask for is just as impossible as though you were to walk in your picture gallery and kneel before your great masterpiece and beg Beatrice herself to step down from the canvas. I began to wonder yesterday," she went on, rising abruptly and moving across the room, "whether I really was that sort of woman. With your money in my pocket and the gambling fever in my pulses, I began even to believe it. And now I know that I am not. Good-bye, Mr. Draconmeyer. I don't blame you. On the whole, perhaps, you have behaved quite well. I think that you have chosen to behave well because that wonderful brain of yours told you that it gave you the best chance. That doesn't really matter, though."

He took a quick, almost a threatening step towards her. His face was dark with all the passions which had preyed upon the man.

"There is a man's last resource," he muttered thickly.

"And there is a woman's answer to it," she replied, her finger suddenly resting upon an unsuspected bell in the wall.

They both heard its summons. Footsteps came hurrying along the corridor. Draconmeyer turned his head away, struggling to compose himself. A waiter entered. Lady Hunterleys picked up her parasol and moved towards the door. The man stood on one side with a bow.

"Here is the waiter you rang for, Mr. Draconmeyer," she remarked, looking over his shoulder. "Wasn't it coffee you wanted? Tell Linda I'll hope to see her sometime this evening."

She strolled away. The waiter remained patiently upon the threshold.

"Coffee for one or two, sir?" he enquired.

Mr. Draconmeyer struggled for a moment against a torrent of words which scorched his lips. In the end, however, he triumphed.

"For one, with cream," he ordered.



CHAPTER XXXV

A NEW MAP OF THE EARTH

Selingman, who was leaning back in a leather-padded chair and smoking a very excellent cigar, looked around at his companions with a smile of complete approval.

"Our host," he declared, bowing to Mr. Grex, "has surpassed himself. For a hired yacht I have seen nothing more magnificent. A Cabinet Moselle, Flor de Cuba cigars, the best of company, and an isolation beyond all question. What place could suit us better?"

There was a little murmur of assent. The four men were seated together in the wonderfully decorated saloon of what was, beyond doubt, a most luxurious yacht. Through the open porthole were visible, every few moments, as the yacht rose and sank on the swell, the long line of lights which fringed the shore between Monte Carlo and Mentone; the mountains beyond, with tiny lights flickering like spangles in a black mantle of darkness; and further round still, the stream of light from the Casino, reflected far and wide upon the black waters.

"None," Mr. Grex asserted confidently. "We are at least beyond reach of these bungling English spies. There is no further fear of eavesdroppers. We are entirely alone. Each may speak his own mind. There is nothing to be feared in the way of interruption. I trust, Monsieur Douaille, that you appreciate the altered circumstances."

Monsieur Douaille, who was looking very much more at his ease, assented without hesitation.

"I must confess," he agreed, "that the isolation we now enjoy is, to a certain extent, reassuring. Here we need no longer whisper. One may listen carefully. One may weigh well what is said. Sooner or later we must come to the crucial point. This, if you like, is a game of make-believe. Then, in make-believe, Germany has offered to restore Alsace and Lorraine, has offered to hold all French territory as sacred, provided France allows her to occupy Calais for one year. What is your object, Herr Selingman? Do you indeed wish to invade England?"

Selingman poured himself out a glass of wine from the bottle which stood at his elbow.

"Good!" he said. "We have come to plain questions. I answer in plain speech. I will tell you now, in a few words, all that remains to be told. Germany has no desire to invade Great Britain. If one may believe the newspapers, there is scarcely an Englishman alive who would credit this simple fact, but it is nevertheless true. Commercially, England, and a certain measure of English prosperity, are necessary to Germany. Geographically, there are certain risks to be run in an invasion of that country, which we do not consider worth while. Besides, an invasion, even a successful one, would result in making an everlasting and a bitter enemy of Great Britain. We learnt our lesson when we took territory from France. We do not need to repeat it. Several hundred thousands of our most worthy citizens are finding an honest and prosperous living in London. Several thousands of our merchants are in business there, and prospering. Several hundreds of our shrewdest men of affairs are making fortunes upon the London Stock Exchange. Therefore, we do not wish to conquer England. Commercially, that conquest is already affected. I want you, Monsieur Douaille, to absolutely understand this, because it may affect your views. What we do require is to strike a long and lasting blow at the navy of Great Britain. As a somewhat larger Holland, Great Britain is welcome to a peaceful existence. When she lords it over the world, talks of an Empire upon which the sun never sets, then the time arrives when we are forced to interfere. Great Britain has possessions which she is not strong enough to hold. Germany is strong enough to wrest them from her, and means to do so. The English fleet must be destroyed. South Africa, then, will come to Germany, India to Russia, Egypt to France. The rest follows as a matter of course."

"And what is the rest?" Monsieur Douaille asked.

Herr Selingman was content no longer to sit in his place. He rose to his feet. His face had fallen into different lines. His eyes flashed, his words were inspired.

"The rest," he declared, "is the crux of the whole matter. It is the one great and settled goal towards which we who have understood have schemed and fought our way. With the British Navy destroyed, the Monroe Doctrine is not worth a sheet of writing-paper. South America is Germany's natural heritage, by every right worth considering. It is our people's gold which founded the Argentine Republic, the brains of our people which control its destinies. Our Eldorado is there, Monsieur Douaille. That is the country which, sooner or later, Germany must possess. We look nowhere else. We covet no other of our neighbours' possessions. Only I say that the sooner America makes up her mind to the sacrifice, the better. Her Monroe Doctrine is all very well for the Northern States. When she presumes to quote it as a pretext for keeping Germany from her natural place in South America, she crosses swords with us. Now you know the truth, and the whole truth. You know, Monsieur Douaille, what we require from you, and you know your reward. Our host has already told you, and will tell you again as often as you like, the feeling of his own country. The Franco-Russian alliance is already doomed. It falls to pieces through sheer lack of common interests. The entente cordiale is simply a fetter and a dead weight upon you. Monsieur Douaille, I put it to you as a man of common sense. Do you think that you, as a statesman—you see, I will put the burden upon your shoulders, because, if you choose, you can speak for your country—do you think that you have a right to refuse from Germany the return of Alsace and Lorraine? Do you think that you can look your country in the face if you refuse on her behalf the greatest gift which has ever yet been offered to any nation—the gift of Egypt? The old alliances are out of date. The balance of power has shifted. I ask you, Monsieur Douaille, as you value the prosperity and welfare of your country, to weigh what I have said and what our great Russian friend has said, word by word. England has made no sacrifices for you. Why should you sacrifice yourself for her?"

Monsieur Douaille stroked his little grey imperial.

"That is well enough," he muttered, "but without the English Navy the balance of power upon the Continent is entirely upset."

"The balance of power only according to the present grouping of interests," Mr. Grex pointed out. "Selingman has shown us how these must change. Frankly, although no one can fail to realise the immense importance of South America as a colonising centre, it is my honest opinion that the nation who scores most by my friend Selingman's plans, is not Germany but France. Think what it means to her. Instead of being a secondary Power, she will of her own might absolutely control the Mediterranean. Egypt, with its vast possibilities, its ever-elastic boundary, falls to her hand. Malta and Cyprus follow. It is a great price that Germany is prepared to pay."

Monsieur Douaille was silent for several moments. It was obvious that he was deeply impressed.

"This is a matter," he said, "which must be considered from many points of view. Supposing that France were willing to bury the hatchet with Germany, to remain neutral or to place Calais at Germany's disposal. Even then, do you suppose, Herr Selingman, that it would be an easy matter to destroy the British Navy?"

"We have our plans," Selingman declared solemnly. "We know very well that they can be carried out only at a great loss both of men and ships. It is a gloomy and terrible task that lies before us, but at the other end of it is the glory that never fades."

"If America," Douaille remarked, "were to have an inkling of your real objective, her own fleet would come to the rescue."

"Why should America know of our ultimate aims?" Selingman rejoined. "Her politicians to-day choose to play the part of the ostrich in the desert. They take no account, or profess to take no account of European happenings. They have no Secret Service. Their country is governed from within for herself only. As for the rest, the bogey of a German invasion has been flaunted so long in England that few people stop to realise the absolute futility of such a course. London is already colonised by Germans—colonised, that is to say, in urban and money-making fashion. English gold is flowing in a never-ending stream into our country. It would be the most foolish dream an ambitious statesman could conceive to lay violent hands upon a land teeming with one's own children. Germany sees further than this. There are richer prizes across the Atlantic, richer prizes from every point of view."

"You mentioned South Africa," Monsieur Douaille murmured.

Selingman shrugged his shoulders.

"South Africa will make no nation rich," he replied. "Her own people are too stubborn and powerful, too rooted to the soil."

Monsieur Douaille for the first time stretched out his hand and drank some of the wine which stood by his side. His cheeks were very pale. He had the appearance of a man tortured by conflicting thoughts.

"I should like to ask you, Selingman," he said, "whether you have made any definite plans for your conflict with the British Navy? I admit that the days of England's unique greatness are over. She may not be in a position to-day, as she has been in former years, to fight the world. At the same time, her one indomitable power is still, whatever people may say or think, her navy. Only last month the Cabinet of my country were considering reports from their secret agents and placing them side by side with known facts, as to the relative strength of your navy and the navy of Great Britain. On paper it would seem that a German success was impossible."

Selingman smiled—the convincing smile of a man who sees further than most men.

"Not under the terms I should propose to you, Monsieur Douaille," he declared. "Remember that we should hold Calais, and we should be assured at least of the amiable neutrality of your fleet. We have spoken of matters so intimate that I do not know whether in this absolute privacy I should not be justified in going further and disclosing to you our whole scheme for an attack upon the English Navy. It would need only an expression of your sympathy with those views which we have discussed, to induce me to do so."

Monsieur Douaille hesitated for several moments before he replied.

"I am a citizen of France," he said, "an envoy without powers to treat. My own province is to listen."

"But your personal sympathies?" Selingman persisted.

"I have sometimes thought," Monsieur Douaille confessed, "that the present grouping of European Powers must gradually change. If your country, for instance," he added, turning to Mr. Grex, "indeed embraces the proposals of Herr Selingman, France must of necessity be driven to reconsider her position towards England. The Anglo-Saxon race may have to battle then for her very existence. Yet it is always to be remembered that in the background are the United States of America, possessing resources and wealth greater than any other country in the universe."

"And it must also be remembered," Selingman proclaimed, in a tone of ponderous conviction, "that she possesses no adequate means of guarding them, that she is not a military nation, that she has not the strength to enforce the carrying out of the Monroe Doctrine. Things were all very well for her before the days of wireless telegraphy, of aeroplanes and airships, of super-dreadnoughts, and cruisers with the speed of express trains. She was too far away to be concerned in European turmoils. To-day science is annihilating distance. America, leaving out of account altogether her military impotence, would need a fleet three times her present strength to enforce the Monroe Doctrine for the remainder—not of this century but of this decade."

Then the bombshell fell. A strange voice suddenly intervened, a voice whose American accent seemed more marked than usual. The four men turned their heads. Selingman sprang to his feet. Mr. Grex's face was marble in its whiteness. Monsieur Douaille, with a nervous sweep of his right arm, sent his glass crashing to the floor. They all looked in the same direction, up to the little music gallery. Leaning over in a careless attitude, with his arms folded upon the rail, was Richard Lane.

"Say," he begged, "can I take a hand in this little discussion?"



CHAPTER XXXVI

CHECKMATE!

Of the four men, Selingman was the first to recover himself.

"Who the hell are you, and how did you get up there?" he roared.

"I am Richard Lane," the young man explained affably, "and there's a way up from the music-room. You probably didn't notice it. And there's a way down, as you may perceive," he added, pointing to the spiral staircase. "I'll join you, if I may."

There was a dead silence as for a moment Richard disappeared and was seen immediately afterwards descending the round staircase. Mr. Grex touched Selingman on the arm and whispered in his ear. Selingman nodded. There were evil things in the faces of both men as Lane approached them.

"Will you kindly explain your presence here at once, sir?" Mr. Grex ordered.

"I say!" Richard protested. "A joke's a joke, but when you ask a man to explain his presence on his own boat, you're coming it just a little thick, eh? To tell you the truth, I had some sort of an idea of asking you the same question."

"What do you mean—your own boat?" Draconmeyer demanded.

He was, perhaps, the first to realise the situation. Richard thrust his hands into his pockets and sat upon the edge of the table.

"Seems to me," he remarked, "that you gentlemen have made some sort of a mistake. Where do you think you are, anyway?"

"On board Schwann's yacht, the Christabel," Selingman replied.

Richard shook his head.

"Not a bit of it," he assured them. "This is the steam-yacht, Minnehaha, which brought me over from New York, and of which I am most assuredly the owner. Now I come to think of it," he went on, "there was another yacht leaving the harbour at the same time. Can't have happened that you boarded the wrong boat, eh?"

Mr. Grex was icily calm, but there was menace of the most dangerous sort in his look and manner.

"Nothing of that sort was possible," he declared, "as you are, without doubt, perfectly well aware. It appears to me that this is a deliberate plot. The yacht which I and my friends thought that we were boarding to-night was the Christabel, which my servant had instructions to hire from Schwann of Monaco. I await some explanation from you, sir, as to your purpose in sending your pinnace to the landing-stage of the Villa Mimosa and deliberately misleading us as to our destination?"

"Well, I don't know that I've got much to say about that," Richard replied easily.

"You are offering us no explanation?" Selingman demanded.

"None," Richard assented coolly.

Selingman suddenly struck the table with his clenched fist.

"You were not alone up in that gallery!"

"Getting warm, aren't you?" Richard murmured.

Selingman turned to Grex.

"This young man is Hunterleys' friend. They've fixed this up between them. Listen!"

A door slammed above their heads. Some one had left the music gallery.

"Hunterleys himself!" Selingman cried.

"Sure!" Richard assented. "Bright fellow, Selingman," he continued amiably. "I wouldn't try that on, if I were you," he added, turning to Mr. Grex, whose hand was slowly stealing from the back of his coat. "That sort of thing doesn't do, nowadays. Revolvers belong to the last decade of intrigue. You're a bit out of date with that little weapon. Don't be foolish. I am not angry with any of you. I am willing to take this little joke pleasantly, but——"

He raised a whistle to his lips and blew it. The door at the further end of the saloon was opened as though by magic. A steward in the yacht's uniform appeared. From outside was visible a very formidable line of sailors. Grex, with a swift gesture, slipped something back into his pocket, something which glittered like silver.

"Serve some champagne, Reynolds," Richard ordered the steward who had come hurrying in, "and bring some cigars."

The man withdrew. Richard seated himself once more upon the table, clasping one knee.

"Look here," he said, "I'll be frank with you. I came into this little affair for the sake of a pal. It was only by accident that I found my way up yonder—more to look after him than anything. I never imagined that you would have anything to say that was interesting to me. Seems I was wrong, though. You've got things very nicely worked out, Mr. Selingman."

Selingman glared at the young man but said nothing. The others, too, were all remarkably bereft of words.

"Don't mind my staying for a little chat, do you?" Richard continued pleasantly. "You see, I am an American and I am kind of interested in the latter portion of what you had to say. I dare say you're quite right in some respects. We are a trifle too commercial and a trifle too cocksure. You see, things have always gone our way. All the same, we've got the stuff, you know. Just consider this. If I thought there was any real need for it, and I begin to think that perhaps there may be, I should be ready to present the United States with a Dreadnought to-morrow, and I don't know that I should need to spend very much less myself. And," he went on, "there are thirty or forty others who could and would do the same. Tidy little fleet we should soon have, you see, without a penny of taxation. Of course, I know we would need the men, but we've a grand reserve to draw upon in the West. They are not bothering about the navy in times of peace, but they'd stream into it fast enough if there were any real need."

The chief steward appeared, followed by two or three of his subordinates. A tray of wine was placed upon the table. Bottles were opened, but no one made any attempt to drink. Richard filled his own glass and motioned the men to withdraw.

"Prefer your own wine?" he remarked. "Well, now, that's too bad. Hope I'm not boring you?"

No one spoke or moved. Richard settled himself a little more comfortably upon the table.

"I can't tell you all," he proceeded, "how interested I have been, listening up there. Quite a gift of putting things clearly, if I may be allowed to say so, you seem to possess, Mr. Selingman. Now here's my reply as one of the poor Anglo-Saxons from the West who've got to make room in the best parts of the world for your lubberly German colonists. If you make a move in the game you've been talking so glibly about, if my word counts for anything, if my persuasions count for anything—and I've facts to go on, you know—you'll have the American fleet to deal with at the same time as the English, and I fancy that will be a trifle more than you can chew up, eh? I'm going back to America a little earlier than I anticipated. Of course, they'll laugh at me at first in Washington. They don't believe much in these round-table conferences and European plots. But all the same I've got some friends there. We'll try and remember this amiable little statement of policy of yours, Mr. Selingman. Nothing like being warned, you know."

Mr. Grex rose from his place.

"Sir," he said, "since we have been and are your unwilling guests, will you be so good as to arrange for us at once to relieve you of our presence?"

"Well, I'm not so sure about that," Richard remarked, meditatively. "I think I'd contribute a good deal to the comfort and happiness of this generation if I took you all out to sea and dropped you overboard, one by one."

"As I presume you have no such intention," Mr. Grex persisted, "I repeat that we should be glad to be allowed to land."

Richard abandoned his indolent posture and stood facing them.

"You came on board, gentlemen, without my invitation," he reminded them. "You will leave my ship when I choose—and that," he added, "is not just at present."

"Do you mean that we are to consider ourselves your prisoners?" Draconmeyer asked, with an acid smile.

"Certainly not—my guests," Richard replied, with a bow. "I can assure you that it will only be a matter of a few hours."

Monsieur Douaille hammered the table with his fist.

"Young man," he exclaimed, "I leave with you! I insist upon it that I am permitted to leave. I am not a party to this conference. I am merely a guest, a listener, here wholly in my private capacity. I will not be associated with whatever political scandal may arise from this affair. I demand permission to leave at once."

"Seems to me there's something in what you say," Richard admitted. "Very well, you can come along. I dare say Hunterleys will be glad to have a chat with you. As for the rest of you," he concluded, as Monsieur Douaille rose promptly to his feet, "I have a little business to arrange on land which I think I could manage better whilst you are at sea. I shall therefore, gentlemen, wish you good evening. Pray consider my yacht entirely at your disposal. My stewards will be only too happy to execute any orders—supper, breakfast, or dinner. You have merely to say the word."

He turned towards the door, closely followed by Douaille, who, in a state of great excitement, refused to listen to Selingman's entreaties.

"No, no!" the former objected, shaking his head. "I will not stay. I will not be associated with this meeting. You are bunglers, all of you. I came only to listen, on your solemn assurance of entire secrecy. We are spied upon at the Villa Mimosa, we are made fools of on board this yacht. No more unofficial meetings for me!"

"Quite right, old fellow," Richard declared, as they passed out and on to the deck. "Set of wrong 'uns, those chaps, even though Mr. Grex is a Grand Duke. You know Sir Henry Hunterleys, don't you?"

Hunterleys came forward from the gangway, at the foot of which the pinnace was waiting.

"We are taking Monsieur Douaille ashore," Richard explained, as the two men shook hands. "He really doesn't belong to that gang and he wants to cut adrift. You understand my orders exactly, captain?" he asked, as they stepped down the iron gangway.

"Perfectly, sir," was the prompt reply. "You may rely upon me. I am afraid they are beginning to make a noise downstairs already!"

The little pinnace shot out a stream of light across the dark, placid sea. Douaille was talking earnestly to Hunterleys.

"Pleasantest few minutes I ever spent in my life," Richard murmured, as he took out his cigarette case.



CHAPTER XXXVII

AN AMAZING ELOPEMENT

The sun was shining brilliantly and the sky was cloudless as Richard turned his automobile into the grounds of the Villa Mimosa, soon after nine o'clock on the following morning. The yellow-blossomed trees, slightly stirred by the west wind, formed a golden arch across the winding avenue. The air was sweet, almost faint with perfume. On the terrace, holding a pair of field-glasses in her hand and gazing intently out to sea, was Fedora. At the sound of the motor-horn she turned quickly. She looked at the visitor in surprise. A shade of pink was in her face. Lane brought the car to a standstill, jumped out and climbed the steps of the terrace.

"What has brought you here?" she asked, in surprise.

"I have just come to pay you a little visit," he remarked easily. "I was only afraid you mightn't be up so early."

She bit her lip.

"You have no right to come here at all," she said severely, "and to present yourself at this hour is unheard of."

"I came early entirely out of consideration for your father," he assured her.

She frowned.

"My father?" she repeated. "Please explain at once what you mean. My father is on that yacht and I cannot imagine why he does not return."

"I can tell you," he answered, standing by her side and looking out seawards. "They are waiting for my orders before they let him off."

She turned her head and looked at him incredulously.

"Explain yourself, please," she insisted.

"With pleasure," he assented. "You see, I just had to make sure of being allowed to have a few minutes' conversation with you, free from any interruption. Somehow or other," he added thoughtfully, "I don't believe your father likes me."

"I do not think," she replied coldly, "that my father has any feelings about you at all, except that he thinks you are abominably presumptuous."

"Because I want to marry you?"

She stamped with her foot upon the ground.

"Please do not say such absurd things! Explain to me at once what you mean by saying that my father is being kept there by your orders."

"I'll try," Lane answered. "He boarded that yacht last night in mistake. He thought that it was a hired one, but it isn't. It's mine. I found him there last night, entertaining a little party of his friends in the saloon. They seemed quite comfortable, so I begged them to remain on as my guests for a short time."

"To remain?" she murmured, bewildered. "For how long?"

"Until you've just read this through and thought it over."

He passed her a document which he had drawn from his pocket. She took it from him wonderingly. When she had read a few lines, the colour came streaming into her cheeks. She threw it to the ground. He picked it up and replaced it in his pocket.

"But it is preposterous!" she cried. "That is a marriage license!"

"That's precisely what it is," he admitted. "I thought we'd be married at Nice. My sister is waiting to go along with us. I said we'd pick her up at the Hotel de Paris."

Severe critics of her undoubted beauty had ventured at times to say that Fedora's face lacked expression. There was, at that moment, no room for any such criticism. Amazement struggled with indignation in her eyes. Her lips were quivering, her breath was coming quickly.

"Do you mean—have you given her or any one to understand that there was any likelihood of my consenting to such an absurd scheme?"

"I only told her what I hoped," he said quietly. "That is all I dared say even to myself. But I want you to listen to me."

His voice had grown softer. She turned her head and looked at him. He was much taller than she was, and in his grey tweed suit, his head a little thrown back, his straw hat clasped in his hands behind him, his clear grey eyes full of serious purpose, he was certainly not an unattractive figure to look upon. Unconsciously she found herself comparing him once more with the men of her world, found herself realising, even against her will, the charm of his naive and dogged honesty, his youth, his tenacity of purpose. She had never been made love to like this before.

"Please listen," he begged. "I am afraid that your father must be in a tearing rage by now, but it can't be helped. He is out there and he hasn't got an earthly chance of getting back until I give the word. We've got plenty of time to reach Nice before he can land. I just want you to realise, Fedora, that you are your own mistress. You can make or spoil your own life. No one else has any right to interfere. Have you ever seen any one yet, back in your own country, amongst your own people, whom you really felt that you cared for—who you really believed would be willing to lay down his life to make you happy?"

"No," she confessed simply, "I do not know that I have. Our men are not like that."

"It is because," he went on, "there is no one back there who cares as I do. I have spent some years of my life looking—quite unconsciously, but looking all the same—for some one like you. Now I have found you I am glad I have waited. There couldn't be any one else. There never could be, Fedora. I love you just in the way a man does love once in his life, if he's lucky. It's a queer sort of feeling, you know," he continued, leaning a little towards her. "It makes me quite sure that I could make you happy. It makes me quite sure that if you'll give me your hand and trust me, and leave everything to me, you'll have just the things in life that women want. Won't you be brave, Fedora? There are some things to break through, I know, but they don't amount to much—they don't, really. And I love you, you know. You can't imagine yet what a wonderful difference that makes. You'll find out and you'll be glad."

She stood quite still. Her eyes were still fixed seawards, but she was looking beyond the yacht, now, to the dim line where sky and sea seemed to meet. The vision of her past days seemed to be drawn out before her, a little monotonous, a little wearisome even in their splendour, more than a little empty. And underneath it all she was listening to the new music, and her heart was telling her the truth.

"You don't need to make any plans," he said softly. "Go and put on your hat and something to wear motoring. Bring a dressing-bag, if you like. Flossie is waiting for us and she is rather a dear. You can leave everything else to me."

She looked timidly into his eyes. A new feeling was upon her. She gave him her hand almost shyly. Her voice trembled.

"If I come," she whispered, "you are quite sure that you mean it all? You are quite sure that you will not change?"

He raised her hand to his lips.

"Not in this world, dear," he answered, with sublime confidence, "nor any other!"

She stole away from him. He was left alone upon the terrace, alone, but with the exquisite conviction of her return, promised in that last half-tremulous, half-smiling look over her shoulder. Then suddenly life seemed to come to him with a rush, a new life, filled with a new splendour. He was almost humbly conscious of bigger things than he had ever realised, a nearness to the clouds, a wonderful, thrilling sense of complete and absolute happiness.... Reluctantly he came back to earth. His thoughts became practical. He went to the back of his car, drew out a rocket on a stick and thrust it firmly into the lawn. Then he started his engine and almost immediately afterwards she came. She was wearing a white silk motor-coat and a thick veil. Behind her came a bewildered French maid, carrying wraps, and a man-servant with a heavy dressing-case. In silence these things were stowed away. She took her place in the car. Lane struck a match and stepped on to the lawn.

"Don't be frightened," he said. "Here goes!"

A rocket soared up into the sky. Then he seated himself beside her and they glided off.

"That means," he explained, "that they'll let your father and the others off in two hours. Give us plenty of time to get to Nice. Have you—left any word for him?"

"I have left a very short message," she answered, "to say that I was going to marry you. He will never forgive me, and I feel very wicked and very ungrateful."

"Anything else?" he whispered, leaning a little towards her.

She sighed.

"And very happy," she murmured.



CHAPTER XXXVIII

HONEYMOONING

Hunterleys saw the Right Honourable Meredith Simpson and Monsieur Douaille off to Paris early that morning. Then he called round at the hospital to find that Sidney Roche was out of danger, and went on to the villa with the good news. On his way back he stayed chatting with the bank manager until rather later than usual, and afterwards strolled on to the Terrace, where he looked with some eagerness towards a certain point in the bay. The Minnehaha had departed. Mr. Grex and his friends, then, had been set free. Hunterleys returned to the hotel thoughtfully. At the entrance he came across two or three trunks being wheeled out, which seemed to him somehow familiar. He stopped to look at the initials. They were his wife's.

"Is Lady Hunterleys leaving to-day?" he asked the luggage-porter.

"By the evening train, sir," the man announced. "She would have caught the Cote d'Azur this morning but there was no place on the train."

Hunterleys was perplexed. Some time after luncheon he enquired for Lady Hunterleys and found that she was not in the hotel. A reception clerk thought that he had seen her go through on her way to the Sporting Club. Hunterleys, after some moments of indecision, followed her. He was puzzled at her impending departure, unable to account for it. The Draconmeyers, he knew, proposed to stay for another month. He walked thoughtfully along the private way and climbed the stairs into the Club. He looked for his wife in her usual place. She was not there. He made a little promenade of the rooms and eventually he found her amongst the spectators around the baccarat table. He approached her at once.

"You are not playing?"

She started at the sound of his voice. She was dressed very simply in travelling clothes, and there were lines under her eyes, as though she were fatigued.

"No," she admitted, "I am not playing."

"I understood in the hotel," he continued, "that you were leaving to-day."

"I am going back to England," she announced. "It does not amuse me here any longer."

He realised at once that something had happened. A curious sense of excitement stole into his blood.

"If you are not playing here, will you come and sit down for a few moments?" he invited. "I should like to talk to you."

She followed him without a word. He led the way to one of the divans in the roulette room.

"Your favourite place," he remarked, "is occupied."

She nodded.

"I have given up playing," she told him.

He looked at her in some surprise. She drew a little breath and kept her eyes steadily averted.

"You will probably know sometime or other," she continued, "so I will tell you now. I have lost four thousand pounds to Mr. Draconmeyer. I am going back to England to realise my own money, so as to be able to pay him at once."

"You borrowed four thousand pounds from Mr. Draconmeyer?" he repeated incredulously.

"Yes! It was very foolish, I know, and I have lost every penny of it. I am not the first woman, I suppose, who has lost her head at Monte Carlo," she added, a little defiantly.

"Does Mr. Draconmeyer know that you are leaving?" he asked.

"Not yet," she answered, after a moment's hesitation. "I had an interview with him yesterday and I realised at once that the money must be paid, and without delay. I realised, too, that it was better I should leave Monte Carlo and break off my association with these people for the present."

In a sense it was a sordid story, yet to Hunterleys her words sounded like music.

"I am very pleased indeed," he said quietly, "that you feel like that. Draconmeyer is not a man to whom I should like my wife to owe money for a moment longer than was absolutely necessary."

"Your estimate of him was correct," she confessed slowly. "I am sorry, Henry."

He rose suddenly to his feet. An inspiration had seized him.

"Come," he declared, "we will pay Draconmeyer back without sending you home to sell your securities. Come and stand with me."

She looked at him in amazement.

"Henry!" she exclaimed. "You are not going to play? Don't! Take my advice and don't!"

He laughed.

"We'll see," he replied confidently. "You wouldn't believe that I was a fatalist, would you? I am, though. Everything that I had hoped for seems to be happening to-day. You have found out Draconmeyer, we have checkmated Mr. Grex, I have drunk the health of Felicia and David Briston—"

"Felicia and David Briston?" she interrupted quickly. "What do you mean?"

"You knew, of course, that they were engaged?" he explained. "I called round at the villa this morning, after I had been to the hospital, and found them busy fixing the wedding day."

She looked at him vaguely.

"Engaged?" she murmured. "Why, I thought—"

A spot of colour suddenly burned in her cheeks. She was beginning to understand. It was Draconmeyer who had put those ideas into her head. Her heart gave a little leap.

"Henry!" she whispered.

He was already at the table, however. He changed five mille notes deliberately, counted his plaques and turned to her.

"I am going to play on your principle," he declared. "I have always thought it an interesting one. See, the last number was twenty-two. I am going to back twenty and all the carres."

He covered the board around number twenty. There were a few minutes of suspense, then the click as the ball fell into the little space.

"Vingt-huit, noir, passe et pair!" the croupier announced.

Hunterleys' stake was swept away. He only smiled.

"Our numbers are going to turn up," he insisted cheerfully. "I am certain of it now. Do you know that this is the first time I have played since I have been in Monte Carlo?"

She watched him half in fear. This time he staked on twenty-nine, with the maximum en plein and all the carres and chevaux. Again the few moments of suspense, the click of the ball, the croupier's voice.

"Vingt-neuf, noir, impair et passe!"

She clutched at his arm.

"Henry!" she gasped.

He laughed.

"Open your bag," he directed. "We'll soon fill it."

He left his stake untouched. Thirty-one turned up. He won two carres and let the table go once without staking. Ten was the next number. Immediately he placed the maximum on number fourteen, carres and chevaux. Again the pause, again the croupier's voice.

"Quatorze rouge, pair et manque!"

Hunterleys showed no exultation and scarcely any surprise. He gathered in his winnings and repeated his stake. This time he won one of his carres. The next time quatorze turned up again. For half-an-hour he continued, following his few chosen numbers according to the run of the table. At the end of that time Violet's satchel was full and he was beginning to collect mille notes for his plaques. He made a little calculation in his mind and decided that he must already have won more than the necessary amount.

"Our last stake," he remarked coolly.

The preceding number had been twenty-six. He placed the maximum on twenty-nine, the carres, chevaux, the column, colour and last dozen. He felt Violet's fingers clutching his arm. There was a little buzz of excitement all round the table as the croupier announced the number.

"Vingt-neuf noir, impair et passe!..."

They took their winnings into the anteroom beyond, where Hunterleys ordered tea. There was a little flush in Violet's cheeks. They counted the money. There was nearly five thousand pounds.

"Henry!" she exclaimed. "I think that that last coup was the most marvellous win I ever saw!"

"A most opportune one, at any rate," he replied grimly. "Look who is coming."

Draconmeyer had entered the room, and was peering everywhere as though in search of some one. He suddenly caught sight of them, hesitated for a moment and then approached. He addressed himself to Violet.

"I have just seen Linda," he said. "She is broken-hearted at the thought of your departure."

"I am sorry to leave her," Violet replied, "but I feel that I have stayed quite long enough in Monte Carlo. By the bye, Mr. Draconmeyer, there is that little affair of the money you were kind enough to advance to me."

Draconmeyer stood quite still. He looked from husband to wife.

"Four thousand pounds, my wife tells me," Hunterleys remarked coolly, as he began to count out the notes. "It is very good of you indeed to have acted as my wife's banker. Do you mind being paid now? Our movements are a little uncertain and it will save the trouble of sending you a cheque."

Draconmeyer laughed. It was not a pleasant laugh, nor was it in the least mirthful.

"Dear me!" he exclaimed. "I had forgotten that little matter. As you will, certainly."

He accepted the notes and stuffed them into his pocket.

"By the bye," he continued, "I think that I ought to congratulate you, Sir Henry. That last little affair of yours was wonderfully stage-managed. Your country owes you more than it is ever likely to pay. You have succeeded, at any rate, in delaying the inevitable."

"I trust," Hunterleys enquired politely, "that you were not detained upon the yacht for very long?"

"We landed at the Villa at twelve o'clock this morning," Draconmeyer replied. "You know, of course, of the little surprise our young American friend had prepared for Mr. Grex?"

Hunterleys shook his head.

"I have heard nothing definite."

"He was married to the daughter of the Grand Duke Augustus at midday at Nice," Draconmeyer announced. "His Serene Highness received a telephone message only a short time ago."

Violet gave a little cry. She leaned across the table eagerly.

"You mean that they have eloped?"

Draconmeyer assented.

"All Monte Carlo will be talking about it to-morrow," he declared. "The Grand Duke has been doing all he can to get it hushed up, but it is useless. I will not detain you any longer. I see that you are about to have tea."

"We shall meet, perhaps, in London?" Hunterleys remarked, as Draconmeyer prepared to depart.

Draconmeyer shook his head.

"I think not," he replied. "The doctors have advised me that the climate of England is bad for my wife's health, and I feel that my own work there is finished. I have received an offer to go out to South America for a time. Very likely I shall accept."

He passed on with a final bow. Violet looked across their table and her eyes shone.

"It seems like a fairy tale, Henry," she whispered. "You don't know what a load on my mind that money has been, and how I was growing to detest Mr. Draconmeyer."

He smiled.

"I was rather hating the beast myself," he admitted. "Tell me, what are your plans, really?"

"I hadn't made any," she confessed, "except to get away as quickly as I could."

He leaned a little across the table.

"Elopements are rather in the fashion," he said. "What do you think? Couldn't we have a little dinner at Ciro's and catch the last train to Nice; have a look at Richard and his wife and then go on to Cannes, and make our way back to England later?"

She looked at him and his face grew younger. There was something in her eyes which reminded him of the days which for so many weary months he had been striving to forget.

"Henry," she murmured, "I have been very foolish. If you can trust me once more, I think I can promise that I'll never be half so idiotic again."

He rose to his feet blithely.

"It has been my fault just as much," he declared, "and the fault of circumstances. I couldn't tell you the whole truth, but there has been a villainous conspiracy going on here. Draconmeyer, Selingman, and the Grand Duke were all in it and I have been working like a slave. Now it's all over, finished this morning on Richard's yacht. We've done what we could. I'm a free lance now and we'll spend the holidays together."

She gave him her fingers across the table and he held them firmly in his. Then she, too, rose and they passed out together. There was a wonderful change in Hunterleys. He seemed to have grown years younger.

"Come," he exclaimed, "they call this the City of Pleasure, but these are the first happy moments I have spent in it. We'll gamble in five-franc pieces for an hour or so. Then we'll go back to the hotel and have our trunks sent down to the station, dine at Ciro's and wire Richard. Where are you going to stake your money?"

"I think I shall begin with number twenty-nine," she laughed.

* * * * *

They lunched with Richard and his wife, a few days later, at the Casino at Cannes. The change in the two young people was most impressive. Fedora had lost the dignified aloofness of Monte Carlo. She seemed as though she had found her girlhood. She was brilliantly, supremely happy. Richard, on the other hand, was more serious. He took Hunterleys on one side as they waited for the cars.

"We are on our way to Biarritz," he said, "by easy stages. The yacht will meet us there and we are going to sail at once for America."

"Fedora doesn't mind?" Hunterleys asked.

"Not in the least," Richard declared exultantly. "She knows what my duty is, and, Hunterleys, I am going to try and do it. The people over there may need a lot of convincing, but they are going to hear the truth from me and have it drummed into them. It's going to be 'Wake up, America!' as well as 'Wake up, England!'"

"Stick at it, Richard," Hunterleys advised. "Don't mind a little discouragement. Men who see the truth and aren't afraid to keep on calling attention to it, get laughed at a great deal. People speak of them tolerantly, listen to what they say, doubt its reasonableness and put it at the back of their heads, but in the end it does good. Your people and mine are slow to believe and slow to understand, but the truth sinks in if one proclaims it often enough and loudly enough. We are going through it in our own country just now, with regard to National Service, for one thing. Here come your cars. You travel in state, Richard."

The young man laughed good-naturedly.

"There's nothing in life which I could give her that Fedora sha'n't have," he asserted. "We spent the first two days absolutely alone. Now her maid and my man come along with the luggage in the heavy car, and we take the little racer. Jolly hard work they have to keep anywhere near us, I can tell you. Say, may I make a rather impertinent remark, Sir Henry?"

"You have earned the right to say anything to me you choose," Hunterleys replied. "Go ahead."

"Why, it's only this," Richard continued, a little awkwardly. "I have never seen Lady Hunterleys look half so ripping, and you seem years younger."

Hunterleys smiled.

"To tell you the truth, I feel it. You see, years ago, when we started out for our honeymoon, there was a crisis after the first week and we had to rush back to England. We seem to have forgotten to ever finish that honeymoon of ours. We are doing it now."

The two women came down the steps, the cynosure of a good many eyes, the two most beautiful women in the Casino. Richard helped his wife into her place, wrapped her up and took the steering wheel.

"Hyeres to-night and Marseilles to-morrow," he announced, "Biarritz on Saturday. We shall stay there for a week, and then—'Wake up, America!'"

The cars glided off. Hunterleys and his wife stood on the steps, waving their hands.

"Something about those children," Hunterleys declared, as they vanished, "makes me feel absurdly young. Let's go shopping, Violet. I want to buy you some flowers and chocolates."

She smiled happily as she took his arm for a moment.

"And then?"

"What would you like to do afterwards?" he asked.

"I think," she replied, leaning towards him, "that I should like to go to that nice Englishman who lets villas, and find one right at the edge of the sea, quite hidden, and lock the gates, and give no one our address, and have you forget for just one month that there was any work to do in the world, or any one else in it except me."

"Just to make up," he laughed softly.

"Women are like that, you know," she murmured.

"The man's office is this way," Hunterleys said, turning off the main street.

THE END



* * * * *



E. Phillips Oppenheim's Novels

We do not stop to inquire into the measure of his art any more than we inquire into that of Alexander Dumas. We only realize that here is a benefactor of tired men and women seeking relaxation.—Independent, New York.

Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo An amazing revelation of war in the making.

The Vanished Messenger What resulted when the Powers conspired against England.

A People's Man How a socialistic leader became involved in international affairs.

The Double Life of Mr. Alfred Burton Oppenheim in a new vein—a pure comedy.

The Mischief-Maker A blending of love, romance, and international intrigue.

The Lighted Way A mystery story that involves the revolution in Portugal.

Havoc An engrossing story of love, mystery, and international intrigue.

Peter Ruff and the Double-Four Deals with a shrewd detective and a mysterious secret society.

The Moving Finger A mystifying story dealing with a wealthy M. P.'s experiment.

Berenice A masterly tale of a strong love that is tragic in its outcome.

The Prince of Sinners An engrossing story of English social and political life.

Anna the Adventuress A surprising tale of a bold deception.

The Master Mummer The strange romance of beautiful Isobel de Sorrens.

The Mysterious Mr. Sabin The ingenious story of a bold international intrigue.

The Yellow Crayon Mr. Sabin's exciting experiences with a powerful secret society.

A Millionaire of Yesterday A gripping story of a wealthy West African miner.

The Man and His Kingdom A dramatic tale of adventure in South America.

The Traitors A capital romance of love, adventure, and Russian intrigue.

The Betrayal A thrilling story of treachery in high diplomatic circles.

A Sleeping Memory The story of an unhappy girl who was deprived of her memory.

Enoch Strone: A Master of Men A tremendously strong story of a self-made man.

A Maker of History A daring tale that "explains" a great historical event.

The Malefactor An amazing story of a strange revenge.

A Lost Leader A realistic romance woven around a striking personality.

The Great Secret Unfolds a stupendous international conspiracy.

The Avenger Unravels the deepest of mysteries with consummate power.

The Long Arm of Mannister Deals with a wronged man's ingenious revenge.

The Tempting of Tavernake In which an unromantic Englishman falls in love and learns something about women.

The Governors A romance of the intrigues of American finance.

Jeanne of the Marshes Strange doings at an English house party are here set forth.

As a Man Lives Discloses the mystery surrounding the fair occupant of a yellow house.

The Illustrious Prince Exposes a Japanese political intrigue in London.

The Lost Ambassador A straightforward mystery tale of Paris and London.

A Daughter of the Marionis A tale of a beautiful Sicilian whose love interfered with her revenge.

The Mystery of Mr. Bernard Brown An ingenious solution of a murder mystery.

The Survivor A striking story of a young Englishman's uphill fight.

The World's Great Snare The love romance of a pretty American girl and an English prospector.

Those Other Days A collection of gripping and vivid stories.

For the Queen Remarkable stories of diplomatic scandals and political intrigue.

THE END