"You are a cynic," Sogrange declared. "You would throw cold water upon any enterprise. Anyway, our detective is coming. We must make use of him, for I have engaged to pay him five dollars."
"We'll go where you like," Peter assented, "so long as we dine on a roof garden. This beastly fur coat keeps me in a chronic state of perspiration."
"Never mind," Sogrange said consolingly, "it's most effective. A roof garden, by all means."
"And recollect," Peter insisted, "I bar Chinatown. We've both of us seen the real thing, and there's nothing real about what they show you here."
"Chinatown is erased from our programme," Sogrange agreed. "We go now to dine. Remind me, Baron, that I inquire for these strange dishes of which one hears—terrapin, canvas-backed duck, green corn, and strawberry shortcake."
Peter smiled grimly.
"How like a Frenchman," he exclaimed, "to take no account of seasons! Never mind, Marquis, you shall give your order and I will sketch the waiter's face. By the by, if you're in earnest about this expedition to-night, put your revolver into your pocket."
"But we're going with an ex-detective," Sogrange replied.
"One never knows," Peter said carelessly.
They dined close to the stone palisading of one of New York's most famous roof gardens. Sogrange ordered an immense dinner, but spent most of his time gazing downwards. They were higher up than at the hotel, and they could see across the tangled maze of lights even to the river, across which the great ferry boats were speeding all the while—huge creatures of streaming fire and whistling sirens. The air where they sat was pure and crisp. There was no fog, no smoke, to cloud the almost crystalline clearness of the night.
"Baron," Sogrange declared, "if I had lived in this city I should have been a different man. No wonder the people are all-conquering."
"Too much electricity in the air for me," Peter answered. "I like a little repose. I can't think where these people find it."
"One hopes," Sogrange murmured, "that before they progress any further in utilitarianism they will find some artist, one of themselves, to express all this."
"In the meantime," Peter interrupted, "the waiter would like to know what we are going to drink. I've eaten such a confounded jumble of things of your ordering that I should like some champagne."
"Who shall say that I am not generous!" Sogrange replied, taking up the wine carte. "Champagne it shall be. We need something to nerve us for our adventures."
Peter leaned across the table.
"Sogrange," he whispered, "for the last twenty-four hours I have had some doubts as to the success of our little enterprise. It has occurred to me more than once that we are being shadowed."
Sogrange frowned.
"I sometimes wonder," he remarked, "how a man of your suspicious nature ever acquired the reputation you undoubtedly enjoy."
"Perhaps it is because of my suspicious nature," Peter said. "There is a man staying in our hotel whom we are beginning to see quite a great deal of. He was talking to the head porter a few minutes before you this afternoon. He supped at the same restaurant last night. He is dining now, three places behind you to the right, with a young lady who has been making flagrant attempts to flirtation with me, notwithstanding my grey hairs."
"Your reputation, my dear Peter," Sogrange murmured.
"As a decoy," Peter interrupted, "the young lady's methods are too vigorous. She pretends to be terribly afraid of her companion, but it is entirely obvious that she is acting on his instructions. Of course, this may be a ruse of the reporters. On the other hand, I think it would be wise to abandon our little expedition to-night."
Sogrange shook his head.
"So far as I am concerned," he said, "I am committed to it."
"In which case," Peter replied, "I am certainly committed to being your companion. The only question is whether one shall fall to the decoy and suffer oneself to be led in the direction her companion desires, or whether we shall go blundering into trouble on our own account with your friend the ex-detective."
Sogrange glanced over his shoulder, leaned back in his chair, for a moment, as though to look at the stars, and finally lit a cigarette.
"There is a lack of subtlety about that young person, Baron," he declared, "which stifles one's suspicions. I suspect her to be merely one more victim to your undoubted charms. In the interests of madame your wife I shall take you away. The decoy shall weave her spells in vain."
They paid their bill and departed a few minutes later. The man and the girl were also in the act of leaving. The former seemed to be having some dispute about the bill. The girl, standing with her back to him, scribbled a line upon a piece of paper, and, as Peter went by, pushed it into his hand with a little warning gesture. In the lift he opened it. The few pencilled words contained nothing but an address: Number 15, 100th Street, East.
"Lucky man!" Sogrange sighed.
Peter made no remark, but he was thoughtful for the next hour or so.
The ex-detective proved to be an individual of fairly obvious appearance, whose complexion and thirst indicated a very possible reason for his life of leisure. He heard with surprise that his patrons were not inclined to visit Chinatown, but he showed a laudable desire to fall in with their schemes, provided always that they included a reasonable number of visits to places where refreshments could be obtained. From first to last the expedition was a disappointment. They visited various smoke-hung dancing halls, decorated for the most part with oleographs and cracked mirrors, in which sickly-looking young men of unwholesome aspect were dancing with their feminine counterparts. The attitude of their guide was alone amusing.
"Say, you want to be careful in here!" he would declare, in an awed tone, on entering one of these tawdry palaces. "Guess this is one of the toughest spots in New York City. You stick close to me and I'll make things all right."
His method of making things all right was the same in every case. He would form a circle of disreputable youths, for whose drinks Sogrange was called upon to pay. The attitude of the young men was more dejected than positively vicious. They showed not the slightest signs of any desire to make themselves unpleasant. Only once, when Sogrange incautiously displayed a gold watch, did the eyes of one or two of their number glisten. The ex-detective changed his place and whispered hoarsely in his patron's ear:
"Say, don't you flash anything of that sort about here! That young cove right opposite to you is one of the best-known sneak-thieves in the city. You're asking for trouble that way."
"If he or any other of them want my watch," Sogrange answered, calmly, "let them come and fetch it. However," he added, buttoning up his coat, "no doubt you are right. Is there anywhere else to take us?"
The man hesitated.
"There ain't much that you haven't seen," he remarked.
Sogrange laughed softly as he rose to his feet.
"A sell, my dear friend," he said to Peter. "This terrible city keeps its real criminal class somewhere else rather than in the show places."
A man who had been standing in the doorway, looking in for several moments, strolled up to them. Peter recognised him at once and touched Sogrange on the arm. The new-comer accosted them pleasantly.
"Say, you'll excuse my butting in," he began, "but I can see you are kind of disappointed. These suckers"—indicating the ex-detective—"talk a lot about what they're going to show you, and when they get you round, it all amounts to nothing. This is the sort of thing they bring you to as representing the wickedness of New York! That's so, Rastall, isn't it?"
The ex-detective looked a little sheepish.
"Yes, there ain't much more to be seen," he admitted. "Perhaps you'll take the job on if you think there is."
"Well, I'd engage to show the gentlemen something a sight more interesting than this," the new-comer continued. "They don't want to sit down and drink with the scum of the earth."
"Perhaps," Sogrange suggested, "this gentleman has something in his mind which he thinks would appeal to us. We have a motor-car outside, and we are out for adventures."
"What sort of adventures?" the new-comer asked bluntly.
Sogrange shrugged his shoulders lightly.
"We are lookers-on merely," he explained. "My friend and I have travelled a good deal. We have seen something of criminal life in Paris and London, Vienna, and Budapest. I shall not break any confidence if I tell you that my friend is a writer, and material such as this is useful."
The new-comer smiled.
"Say," he exclaimed, "in a way, it's fortunate for you that I happened along! You come right with me and I'll show you something that very few other people in this city know of. Guess you'd better pay this fellow off," he added, indicating the ex-detective. "He's no more use to you."
Sogrange and Peter exchanged questioning glances.
"It is very kind of you, sir," Peter decided, "but for my part I have had enough for one evening."
"Just as you like, of course," the other remarked, with studied unconcern.
"What kind of place would it be?" Sogrange asked.
The new-comer drew them on one side, although, as a matter of fact, everyone else had melted away.
"Have you ever heard of the secret societies of New York?" he inquired. "Well, I guess you haven't, anyway—not to know anything about them. Well, then, listen. There's a society meets within a few steps of here, which has more to do with regulating the criminal classes of the city than any police establishment. There'll be a man there within an hour or so who, to my knowledge, has committed seven murders. The police can't get him. They never will. He's under our protection."
"May we visit such a place as you describe without danger?" Peter asked calmly.
"No!" the man answered. "There's danger in going anywhere, it seems to me, if it's worth while. So long as you keep a still tongue in your head and don't look about you too much, there's nothing will happen to you. If you get gassing a lot, you might tumble in for almost anything. Don't come unless you like. It's a chance for you, as you're a writer, but you'd best keep out of it if you're in any way nervous."
"You said it was quite close?" Sogrange inquired.
"Within a yard or two," the man replied. "It's right this way."
They left the hall with their new escort. When they looked for their motor-car, they found it had gone.
"It don't do to keep them things waiting about round here," their new friend remarked, carelessly. "I guess I'll send you back to your hotel all right. Step this way."
"By the by, what street is this we are in?" Peter asked.
"100th Street," the man answered.
Peter shook his head.
"I'm a little superstitious about that number," he declared. "Is that an elevated railway there? I think we've had enough, Sogrange."
Sogrange hesitated. They were standing now in front of a tall, gloomy house, unkempt, with broken gate—a large but miserable-looking abode. The passers-by in the street were few. The whole character of the surroundings was squalid. The man pushed open the broken gate.
"You cross the road right there to the elevated," he directed. "If you ain't coming, I'll bid you good-night."
Once more they hesitated. Peter, perhaps, saw more than his companion. He saw the dark shapes lurking under the railway arch. He knew instinctively that they were in some sort of danger. And yet the love of adventure was on fire in his blood. His belief in himself was immense. He whispered to Sogrange.
"I do not trust our guide," he said. "If you care to risk it, I am with you."
"Mind the broken pavement," the man called out. "This ain't exactly an abode of luxury."
They climbed some broken steps. Their guide opened a door with a Yale key. The door swung to after them and they found themselves in darkness. There had been no light in the windows. There was no light, apparently, in the house. Their companion produced an electric torch from his pocket.
"You had best follow me," he advised. "Our quarters face out the other way. We keep this end looking a little deserted."
They passed through a swing door and everything was at once changed. A multitude of lamps hung from the ceiling, the floor was carpeted, the walls clean.
"We don't go in for electric light," their guide explained, "as we try not to give the place away. We manage to keep it fairly comfortable, though."
He pushed open the door and entered a somewhat gorgeously furnished salon. There were signs here of feminine occupation, an open piano, and the smell of cigarettes. Once more Peter hesitated.
"Your friends seem to be in hiding," he remarked. "Personally, I am losing my curiosity."
"Guess you won't have to wait very long," the man replied, with meaning.
The room was suddenly invaded on all sides. Four doors, which were quite hidden by the pattern of the wall, had opened almost simultaneously, and at least a dozen men had entered. This time both Sogrange and Peter knew that they were face to face with the real thing. These were men who came silently in, not cigarette-stunted youths. Two of them were in evening dress; three or four had the appearance of prize-fighters. In their countenances was one expression common to all—an air of quiet and conscious strength.
A fair-headed man, in a dinner jacket and black tie, became at once their spokesman. He was possessed of a very slight American accent, and he beamed at them through a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles.
"Gentlemen," he said, "I am very glad to meet you both."
"Very kind of you, I'm sure," Sogrange answered. "Our friend here," he added, indicating their guide, "found us trying to gain a little insight into the more interesting part of New York life. He was kind enough to express a wish to introduce us to you."
The man smiled. He looked very much like some studious clerk, except that his voice seemed to ring with some latent power.
"I am afraid," he said, "that your friend's interest in you was not entirely unselfish. For three days he has carried in his pocket an order instructing him to produce you here."
"I knew it!" Peter whispered, under his breath.
"You interest me," Sogrange replied. "May I know whom I have the honour of addressing?"
"You can call me Burr," the man announced; "Philip Burr. Your names it is not our wish to know."
"I am afraid I do not quite understand," Sogrange said.
"It was scarcely to be expected that you should," Mr. Philip Burr admitted. "All I can tell you is that, in cases like yours, I really prefer not to know with whom I have to deal."
"You speak as though you had business with us," Peter remarked.
"Without doubt, I have," the other replied, grimly. "It is my business to see that you do not leave these premises alive."
Sogrange drew up a chair against which he had been leaning, and sat down.
"Really," he said, "that would be most inconvenient."
Peter, too, shook his head, sitting upon the end of a sofa and folding his arms. Something told him that the moment for fighting was not yet.
"Inconvenient or not," Mr. Philip Burr continued, "I have orders to carry out which I can assure you have never yet been disobeyed since the formation of our society. From what I can see of you, you appear to be very amiable gentlemen, and if it would interest you to choose the method—say, of your release—why, I can assure you we'll do all we can to meet your views."
"I am beginning," Sogrange remarked, "to feel quite at home."
"You see, we've been through this sort of thing before," Peter added, blandly.
Mr. Philip Burr took a cigar from his case and lit it. At a motion of his hand one of the company passed the box to his two guests.
"You're not counting upon a visit from the police, or anything of that sort, I hope?" Mr. Philip Burr asked.
Sogrange shook his head.
"Certainly not," he replied. "I may say that much of the earlier portion of my life was spent in frustrating the well-meant but impossible schemes of that body of men."
"If only we had a little more time," Mr. Burr declared, "it seems to me I should like to make the acquaintance of you two gentlemen."
"The matter is entirely in your own hands," Peter reminded him. "We are in no hurry."
Mr. Burr smiled genially.
"You make me think better of humanity," he confessed. "A month ago we had a man here—got him along somehow or other—and I had to tell him that he was up against it like you two are. My! the fuss he made! Kind of saddened me to think a man should be such a coward."
"Some people are like that," Sogrange remarked. "By the by, Mr. Burr, you'll pardon my curiosity. Whom have we to thank for our introduction here to-night?"
"I don't know as there's any particular harm in telling you," Mr. Burr replied.
"Nor any particular good," a man who was standing by his side interrupted. "Say, Phil, you drag these things out too much. Are there any questions you've got to ask 'em, or any property to collect?"
"Nothing of the sort," Mr. Burr admitted.
"Then let the gang get to work," the other declared.
The two men were suddenly conscious that they were being surrounded. Peter's hand stole on to the butt of his revolver. Sogrange rose slowly to his feet. His hands were thrust out in front of him with the thumbs turned down. The four fingers of each hand flashed for a minute through the air. Mr. Philip Burr lost all his self-control.
"Say, where the devil did you learn that trick?" he cried.
Sogrange laughed scornfully.
"Trick!" he exclaimed. "Philip Burr, you are unworthy of your position. I am the Marquis de Sogrange, and my friend here is the Baron de Grost."
Mr. Philip Burr had no words. His cigar had dropped on to the carpet. He was simply staring.
"If you need proof," Sogrange continued, "further than any I have given you, I have in my pocket, at the present moment, a letter, signed by you yourself, pleading for formal reinstatement. This is how you would qualify for it! You make use of your power to run a common decoy house, to do away with men for money. What fool gave you our names, pray?"
Mr. Philip Burr was only the wreck of a man. He could not even control his voice.
"It was some German or Belgian nobleman," he faltered. "He brought us excellent letters, and he made a large contribution. It was the Count von Hern."
The anger of Sogrange seemed suddenly to fade away. He threw himself into a chair by the side of his companion.
"My dear Baron," he exclaimed, "Bernadine has scored, indeed! Your friend has a sense of humour which overwhelms me. Imagine it. He has delivered the two heads of our great society into the hands of one of its cast-off branches! Bernadine is a genius, indeed!"
Mr. Philip Burr began slowly to recover himself. He waved his hand. Nine out of the twelve men left the room.
"Marquis," he said, "for ten years there has been no one whom I have desired to meet so much as you. I came to Europe, but you declined to receive me. I know very well we can't keep our end up like you over there, because we haven't politics and those sort of things to play with, but we've done our best. We've encouraged only criminology of the highest order. We've tried all we can to keep the profession select. The gaol-bird pure and simple we have cast out. The men who have suffered at our hands have been men who have met with their deserts."
"What about us?" Peter demanded. "It seems to me that you had most unpleasant plans for our future."
Philip Burr held up his hands.
"As I live," he declared, "this is the first time that any money consideration has induced me to break away from our principles. Count von Hern had powerful friends who were our friends, and he gave me the word, straight, that you two had an appointment down below which was considerably overdue. I don't know, even now, why I consented. I guess it isn't much use apologising."
Sogrange rose to his feet.
"Well," he said, "I am not inclined to bear malice, but you must understand this from me, Philip Burr. As a society I dissolve you. I deprive you of your title and of your signs. Call yourself what you will, but never again mention the name of the 'Double Four.' With us in Europe another era has dawned. We are on the side of law and order. We protect only criminals of a certain class, in whose operations we have faith. There is no future for such a society in this country. Therefore, as I say, I dissolve it. Now, if you are ready, perhaps you will be so good as to provide us with the means of reaching our hotel."
Philip Burr led them into a back street, where his own handsome automobile was placed at their service.
"This kind of breaks me all up," he declared, as he gave the instructions to the chauffeur. "If there were two men on the face of this earth whom I'd have been proud to meet in a friendly sort of way, it's you two."
"We bear no malice, Mr. Burr," Sogrange assured him. "You can, if you will do us the honour, lunch with us to-morrow at one o'clock at Rector's. My friend here is very interested in the Count von Hern, and he would probably like to hear exactly how this affair was arranged."
"I'll be there, sure," Philip Burr promised with a farewell wave of the hand.
Sogrange and Peter drove towards their hotel in silence. It was only when they emerged into the civilised part of the city that Sogrange began to laugh softly.
"My friend," he murmured, "you bluffed fairly well, but you were afraid. Oh, how I smiled to see your fingers close round the butt of that revolver!"
"What about you?" Peter asked gruffly. "You don't suppose you took me in, do you?"
Sogrange smiled.
"I had two reasons for coming to New York," he said. "One we accomplished upon the steamer. The other was——"
"Well?"
"To reply personally to this letter of Mr. Philip Burr," Sogrange replied, "which letter, by the by, was dated from 15, 100th Street, New York. An ordinary visit there would have been useless to me. Something of this sort was necessary."
"Then you knew!" Peter gasped. "Notwithstanding all your bravado, you knew."
"I had a very fair idea," Sogrange admitted. "Don't be annoyed with me, my friend. You have had a little experience. It is all useful. It isn't the first time you've looked death in the face. Adventures come to some men unasked. You, I think, were born with the habit of them."
Peter smiled. They had reached the hotel courtyard, and he raised himself stiffly.
"There's a fable about the pitcher that went once too often to the well," he remarked. "I have had my share of luck—more than my share. The end must come some time, you know."
"Is this superstition?" Sogrange asked.
"Superstition pure and simple," Peter confessed, taking his key from the office. "It doesn't alter anything. I am fatalist enough to shrug my shoulders and move on. But I tell you, Sogrange," he added, after a moment's pause, "I wouldn't admit it to anyone else in the world, but I am afraid of Bernadine. I have had the best of it so often. It can't last. In all we've had twelve encounters. The next will be the thirteenth."
Sogrange shrugged his shoulders slightly as he rang for the lift.
"I'd propose you for the Thirteen Club, only there's some uncomfortable clause about yearly suicides which might not suit you," he remarked.
"Good night, and don't dream of Bernadine and your thirteenth encounter."
"I only hope," Peter murmured, "that I may be in a position to dream after it!"
Baron de Grost glanced at the card which his butler had brought in to him, carelessly at first, afterwards with that curious rigidity of attention which usually denotes the setting free of a flood of memories.
"The gentleman would like to see you, sir," the man announced.
"You can show him in at once," Peter replied.
The servant withdrew. Peter, during those few minutes of waiting, stood with his back to the room and his face to the window, looking out across the square, in reality seeing nothing, completely immersed in this strange flood of memories. John Dory—Sir John Dory now—a quondam enemy, whom he had met but seldom during these later years. The figure of this man, who had once loomed so largely in his life, had gradually shrunk away into the background. Their avoidance of each other arose, perhaps, from a sort of instinct which was certainly no matter of ill-will. Still, the fact remained that they had scarcely exchanged a word for years, and Peter turned to receive his unexpected guest with a curiosity which he did not trouble wholly to conceal.
Sir John Dory—Chief Commissioner of Scotland Yard, a person of weight and importance—had changed a great deal during the last few years. His hair had become grey, his walk more dignified. There was the briskness, however, of his best days in his carriage, and in the flash of his brown eyes. He held out his hand to his ancient foe with a smile.
"My dear Baron," he said, "I hope you are going to say that you are glad to see me."
"Unless," Peter replied, with a good-humoured grimace, "your visit is official, I am more than glad—I am charmed. Sit down. I was just going to take my morning cigar. You will join me? Good! Now I am ready for the worst that can happen."
The two men seated themselves. John Dory pulled at his cigar appreciatively, sniffed its flavour for a moment, and then leaned forward in his chair.
"My visit, Baron," he announced, "is semi-official. I am here to ask you a favour."
"An official favour?" Peter demanded quickly.
His visitor hesitated, as though he found the question hard to answer.
"To tell you the truth," he declared, "this call of mine is wholly an inspiration. It does not in any way concern you personally, or your position in this country. What that may be I do not know, except that I am sure it is above any suspicion."
"Quite so," Peter murmured. "How diplomatic you have become, my dear friend!"
John Dory smiled.
"Perhaps I am fencing about too much," he said. "I know, of course, that you are a member of a very powerful and wealthy French society, whose object and aims, so far as I know, are entirely harmless."
"I am delighted to be assured that you recognise that fact," Peter admitted.
"I might add," John Dory continued, "that this harmlessness is of recent date."
"Really, you do seem to know a good deal," Peter confessed.
"I find myself still fencing," Dory declared. "A matter of habit, I suppose. I didn't mean to when I came. I made up my mind to tell you simply that Guillot was in London, and to ask you if you could help me to get rid of him."
Peter looked thoughtfully into his companion's face, but he did not speak. He understood at such moments the value of silence.
"We speak together," Dory continued softly, "as men who understand one another. Guillot is the one criminal in Europe whom we all fear; not I alone, mind you—it is the same in Berlin, in Petersburg, in Vienna. He has never been caught. It is my honest belief that he never will be caught. At the same time, wherever he arrives the thunderclouds gather. He leaves behind him always a trail of evil deeds."
"Very well put," Peter murmured. "Quite picturesque."
"Can you help me to get rid of him?" Dory inquired. "I have my hands full just now, as you can imagine, what with the political crisis and these constant mass meetings. I want Guillot out of the country. If you can manage this for me I shall be your eternal debtor."
"Why do you imagine," Peter asked, "that I can help you in this matter?"
There was a brief silence. John Dory knocked the ash from his cigar.
"Times have changed," he said. "The harmlessness of your great society, my dear Baron, is at present admitted. But there were days——"
"Exactly," Peter interrupted. "As shrewd as ever, I perceive. Do you know anything of the object of his coming?"
"Nothing."
"Anything of his plans?"
"Nothing."
"You know where he is staying?"
"Naturally," Dory answered. "He has taken a second-floor flat in Crayshaw Mansions, Shaftesbury Avenue. As usual, he is above all petty artifices. He has taken it under the name of Monsieur Guillot."
"I really don't know whether there is anything I can do," Peter decided, "but I will look into the matter for you with pleasure. Perhaps I may be able to bring a little influence to bear—indirectly, of course. If so, it is at your service. Lady Dory is well, I trust?"
"In the best of health," Sir John replied, accepting the hint and rising to his feet. "I shall hear from you soon?"
"Without a doubt," Peter answered. "I must certainly call upon Monsieur Guillot."
Peter wasted no time in paying his promised visit. That same afternoon he rang the bell at the flat in Crayshaw Mansions. A typical French butler showed him into the room where the great man sat. Monsieur Guillot, slight, elegant, preeminently a dandy, was lounging upon a sofa, being manicured by a young lady. He threw down hisPetit Journaland rose to his feet, however, at his visitor's entrance.
"My dear Baron," he exclaimed, "but this is charming of you! Mademoiselle," he added, turning to the manicurist, "you will do me the favour of retiring for a short time. Permit me."
He opened the door and showed her out. Then he came back to Peter.
"A visit of courtesy, Monsieur le Baron?" he asked.
"Without a doubt," Peter replied.
"It is beyond all measure charming of you," Guillot declared, "but let me ask you a question. Is it peace or war?"
"It is what you choose to make it," Peter answered.
The man threw out his hands. There was the shadow of a frown upon his pale forehead. It was a matter for protest, this.
"Why do you come?" he demanded. "What have we in common? The society has expelled me. Very well, I go my own way. Why not? I am free of your control to-day. You have no more right to interfere with my schemes than I with yours."
"We have the ancient right of power," Peter said grimly. "You were once a prominent member of our organisation, the spoilt protégé of madame, a splendid maker, if you will, of criminal history. Those days have passed. We offered you a pension which you have refused. It is now our turn to speak. We require you to leave this city in twenty-four hours."
The man's face was livid with anger. He was of the fair type of Frenchman, with deep-set eyes, and a straight, cruel mouth only partly concealed by his golden moustache. Just now, notwithstanding the veneer of his too perfect clothes and civilised air, the beast had leapt out. His face was like the face of a snarling animal.
"I refuse!" he cried. "It is I who refuse! I am here on my own affairs. What they may be is no business of yours or of anyone else's. That is my answer to you, Baron de Grost, whether you come to me for yourself or on behalf of the society to which I no longer belong. That is my answer—that and the door," he added, pressing the bell. "If you will, we fight. If you are wise, forget this visit as quickly as you can."
Peter took up his hat. The man-servant was already in the room.
"We shall probably meet again before your return, Monsieur Guillot," he remarked.
Guillot had recovered himself. His smile was wicked, but his bow perfection.
"To the fortunate hour, Monsieur le Baron!" he replied.
Peter drove back to Berkeley Square, and without a moment's hesitation pressed the levers which set in work the whole underground machinery of the great power which he controlled. Thence-forward Monsieur Guillot was surrounded with a vague army of silent watchers. They passed in and out even of his flat, their motor-cars were as fast as his in the streets, their fancy in restaurants identical with his. Guillot moved through it all like a man wholly unconscious of espionage, showing nothing of the murderous anger which burned in his blood. The reports came to Peter every hour, although there was, indeed, nothing worth chronicling. Monsieur Guillot's visit to London would seem, indeed, to be a visit of gallantry. He spent most of his time with Mademoiselle Louise, the famous dancer. He was prominent at the Empire to watch her nightly performance; they were a noticeable couple supping together at the Milan afterwards. Peter smiled as he read the reports. Monsieur Guillot was indeed a man of gallantry, but he had the reputation of using these affairs to cloak his real purpose. Those who watched him watched only the more closely. Monsieur Guillot, who stood it very well at first, unfortunately lost his temper. He drove to Berkeley Square in the great motor-car which he had brought with him from Paris, and confronted Peter.
"My friend," he exclaimed, though, indeed, the glitter in his eyes knew nothing of friendship, "it is intolerable, this! Do you think that I do not see through these dummy waiters, these obsequious shopmen, these ladies who drop their eyes when I pass, these commissionaires, these would-be acquaintances? I tell you that they irritate me, this incompetent, futile crowd. You pit them against me! Bah! You should know better. When I choose to disappear, I shall disappear, and no one will follow me. When I strike, I shall strike, and no one will discover what my will may be. You are out of date, dear Baron, with your third-rate army of stupid spies. You succeed in one thing only—you succeed in making me angry."
"It is at least an achievement, that," Peter declared.
"Perhaps," Monsieur Guillot admitted fiercely. "Yet mark now the result. I defy you, you and all of them. Look at your clock. It is five minutes to seven. It goes well, that clock, eh?"
"It is the correct time," Peter said.
"Then by midnight," Guillot continued, shaking his fist in the other's face, "I shall have done that thing which brought me to England, and I shall have disappeared. I shall have done it in spite of your watchers, in spite of your spies, in spite, even, of you, Monsieur le Baron de Grost. There is my challenge.Voilà.Take it up if you will. At midnight you shall hear me laugh. I have the honour to wish you good night!"
Peter opened the door with his own hands.
"This is excellent," he declared. "You are now, indeed, the Monsieur Guillot of old. Almost you persuade me to take up your challenge."
Guillot laughed derisively.
"As you please!" he exclaimed. "By midnight to-night!"
The challenge of Monsieur Guillot was issued precisely at four minutes before seven. On his departure, Peter spent the next half-hour studying certain notes and sending various telephone messages. Afterwards he changed his clothes at the usual time and sat down to atête-à-têtedinner with his wife. Three times during the course of the meal he was summoned to the telephone, and from each visit he returned more perplexed. Finally, when the servants had left the room, he took his chair round to his wife's side.
"Violet," he said, "you were asking me just now about the telephone. You were quite right. These were not ordinary messages which I have been receiving. I am engaged in a little matter which, I must confess, perplexes me. I want your advice—perhaps your help."
Violet smiled.
"I am quite ready," she announced. "It is a long time since you gave me anything to do."
"You have heard of Guillot?"
She reflected a moment.
"You mean the wonderful Frenchman," she asked, "the head of the criminal department of the Double Four?"
"The man who was at its head when it existed," Peter replied. "The criminal department, as you know, has all been done away with. The Double Four has now no more concern with those who break the law, save in those few instances where great issues demand it."
"But Monsieur Guillot still exists?"
"He not only exists," Peter answered, "but he is here in London, a rebel and a defiant one. Do you know who came to see me the other morning?"
She shook her head.
"Sir John Dory," Peter continued. "He came here with a request. He begged for my help. Guillot is here, committed to some enterprise which no man can wholly fathom. Dory has enough to do with other things, as you can imagine, just now. Besides, I think he recognises that Monsieur Guillot is rather a hard nut for the ordinary English detective to crack."
"And you?" she demanded, breathlessly.
"I join forces with Dory," Peter admitted. "Sogrange agrees with me. Guillot was associated with the Double Four too long for us to have him make scandalous history, either here or in Paris."
"You have seen him?"
"I have not only seen him," Peter said, "I have declared war against him."
"And he?"
"Guillot is defiant," Peter replied. "He has been here only this evening. He mocks at me. He swears that he will bring off this enterprise, whatever it may be, before midnight to-night, and he has defied me to stop him."
"But you will," she murmured softly.
Peter smiled. The conviction in his wife's tone was a subtle compliment which he did not fail to appreciate.
"I have hopes," he confessed, "and yet, let me tell you this, Violet, I have never been more puzzled. Ask yourself, now. What enterprise is there worthy of a man like Guillot, in which he could engage himself here in London between now and midnight? Any ordinary theft is beneath him. The purloining of the Crown jewels, perhaps, he might consider, but I don't think that anything less in the way of robbery would bring him here. He has his code and he is as vain as a peacock. Yet money is at the root of everything he does."
"How does he spend his time here?" Violet asked.
"He has a handsome flat in Shaftesbury Avenue," Peter answered, "where he lives, to all appearance, the life of an idle man of fashion. The whole of his spare time is spent with Mademoiselle Louise, the danseuse at the Empire. You see, it is half-past eight now. I have eleven men altogether at work, and according to my last report he was dining with her in the grillroom at the Milan. They ordered their coffee just ten minutes ago, and the car is waiting outside to take Mademoiselle to the Empire. Guillot's box is engaged there, as usual. If he proposes to occupy it, he is leaving himself a very narrow margin of time to carry out any enterprise worth speaking of."
Violet was thoughtful for several moments. Then she crossed the room, took up a copy of an illustrated paper, and brought it across to Peter. He smiled as he glanced at the picture to which she pointed, and the few lines underneath.
"It has struck you, too, then!" he exclaimed. "Good! You have answered me exactly as I hoped. Somehow, I scarcely trusted myself. I have both cars waiting outside. We may need them. You won't mind coming to the Empire with me?"
"Mind?" she laughed. "I only hope I may be in at the finish."
"If the finish," Peter remarked, "is of the nature which I anticipate, I shall take particularly good care that you are not."
The curtain was rising upon the first act of the ballet as they entered the music-hall and were shown to the box which Peter had engaged. The house was full—crowded, in fact, almost to excess. They had scarcely taken their seats when a roar of applause announced the coming of Mademoiselle Louise. She stood for a moment to receive her nightly ovation, a slim, beautiful creature, looking out upon the great house with that faint, bewitching smile at the corners of her lips which every photographer in Europe had striven to reproduce. Then she moved away to the music, an exquisite figure, the personification of all that was alluring in her sex. Violet leaned forward to watch her movements as she plunged into the first dance. Peter was occupied looking round the house. Monsieur Guillot was there, sitting insolently forward in his box, sleek and immaculate. He even waved his hand and bowed as he met Peter's eye. Somehow or other, his confidence had its effect. Peter began to feel vaguely troubled. After all, his plans were built upon a surmise. It was so easy for him to be wrong. No man would show his hand so openly who was not sure of the game. Then his face cleared a little. In the adjoining box to Guillot's the figure of a solitary man was just visible, a man who had leaned over to applaud Louise, but who was now sitting back in the shadows. Peter recognised him at once, notwithstanding the obscurity. This was so much to the good, at any rate. He took up his hat.
"For a quarter of an hour you will excuse me, Violet," he said. "Watch Guillot. If he leaves his place, knock at the door of your box, and one of my men, who is outside, will come to you at once. He will know where to find me."
Peter hurried away, pausing for a moment in the promenade to scribble a line or two at the back of one of his own cards. Presently he knocked at the door of the box adjoining Guillot's and was instantly admitted. Violet continued her watch. She remained alone until the curtain fell upon the first act of the ballet. A few minutes later Peter returned. She knew at once that things were going well. He sank into a chair by her side.
"I have messages every five minutes," he whispered in her ear, "and I am venturing upon a bold stroke. There is still something about the affair, though, which I cannot understand. You are absolutely sure that Guillot has not moved?"
Violet pointed with her programme across the house.
"There he sits," she remarked. "He left his chair as the curtain went down, but he could scarcely have gone out of the box, for he was back within ten seconds."
Peter looked steadily across at the opposite box. Guillot was sitting a little farther back now, as though he no longer courted observation. Something about his attitude puzzled the man who watched him. With a quick movement he caught up the glasses which stood by his wife's side. The curtain was going up for the second act, and Guillot had turned his head. Peter held the glasses only for a moment to his eyes, and then glanced down at the stage.
"My God!" he muttered. "The man's a genius! Violet, the small motor is coming for you."
He was out of the box in a single step. Violet looked after him, looked down upon the stage and across at Guillot's box. It was hard to understand.
The curtain had scarcely rung up upon the second act of the ballet when a young lady, who met from all the loungers, and even from the door-keeper himself, the most respectful attention, issued from the stage-door at the Empire and stepped into the large motor-car which was waiting, drawn up against the kerb. The door was opened from inside and closed at once. She held out her hands, as yet ungloved, to the man who sat back in the corner.
"At last!" she murmured. "And I thought that you had forsaken me. It seemed, indeed, dear one, that you had forsaken me."
He took her hands and held them tightly, but he answered only in a whisper. He wore a sombre black cloak and a broad-brimmed hat. A muffler concealed the lower part of his face. She put her finger upon the electric light, but he stopped her.
"I must not be recognised," he said thickly. "Forgive me, Louise, if I seem strange at first, but there is more in it than I can tell you. No one must know that I am in London to-night. When we reach this place to which you are taking me, and we are really alone, then we can talk. I have so much to say."
She looked at him doubtfully. It was indeed a moment of indecision with her. Then she began to laugh softly.
"Little one, but you have changed!" she exclaimed compassionately. "After all, why not? I must not forget that things have gone so hardly with you. It seems odd, indeed, to see you sitting there, muffled up like an old man, afraid to show yourself. You know how foolish you are? With your black cape and that queer hat, you are so different from all the others. If you seek to remain unrecognised, why do you not dress as all the men do? Anyone who was suspicious would recognise you from your clothes."
"It is true," he muttered. "I did not think of it."
She leaned towards him.
"You will not even kiss me?" she murmured.
"Not yet," he answered.
She made a little grimace.
"But you are cold!"
"You do not understand," he answered. "They are watching me—even to-night they are watching me. Oh, if you only knew, Louise, how I have longed for this hour that is to come!"
Her vanity was assuaged. She patted his hand, but came no nearer.
"You are a foolish little one," she said, "very foolish."
"It is not for you to say that," he replied. "If I have been foolish, were not you often the cause of my folly."
Again she laughed.
"Oh, la, la! It is always the same! It is always you men who accuse! For that presently I shall reprove you. But now—as for now, behold, we have arrived!"
"It is a crowded thoroughfare," the man remarked nervously, looking up and down Shaftesbury Avenue.
"Stupid!" she cried, stepping out. "I do not recognise you to-night, little one. Even your voice is different. Follow me quickly across the pavement and up the stairs. There is only one flight. The flat I have borrowed is on the second floor. I do not care very much that people should recognise me either, under the circumstances. There is nothing they love so much," she added, with a toss of the head, "as finding an excuse to have my picture in the paper."
He followed her down the dim hall and up the broad, flat stairs, keeping always some distance behind. On the first landing she drew a key from her pocket and opened a door. It was the door of Monsieur Guillot's sitting-room. A round table in the middle was laid for supper. One light alone, and that heavily shaded, was burning.
"Oh, la, la," she exclaimed. "How I hate this darkness! Wait till I can turn on the lights, dear friend, and then you must embrace me. It is from outside, I believe. No, do not follow. I can find the switch for myself. Remain where you are. I return instantly."
She left him alone in the room, closing the door softly. In the passage she reeled for a moment and caught at her side. She was very pale. Guillot, coming swiftly up the steps, frowned as he saw her.
"He is there?" he demanded harshly.
"He is there," Louise replied; "but, indeed, I am angry with myself. See, I am faint. It is a terrible thing, this, which I have done. He did me no harm, that young man, except that he was stupid and heavy, and that I never loved him. Who could love him, indeed? But, Guillot——"
He passed on, scarcely heeding her words, but she clung to his arm.
"Dear one," she begged, "promise that you will not really hurt him. Promise me that, or I will shriek out and call the people from the streets here. You will not make an assassin of me? Promise!"
Guillot turned suddenly towards her, and there were strange things in his face. He pointed down the stairs.
"Go back, Louise," he ordered, "back to your rooms, for your own sake. Remember that you left the theatre, too ill to finish your performance. You have had plenty of time already to get home. Quick! Leave me to deal with this young man. I tell you to go."
She retreated down the stairs, dumb, her knees shaking still as though with fear. Guillot entered the room, closing the door behind him. Even as he bowed to that dark figure standing in the corner, his left hand shot forward the bolt.
"Monsieur," he said.
"What is the meaning of this?" the visitor interrupted haughtily. "I am expecting Mademoiselle Louise. I did not understand that strangers had the right of entry into this room."
Guillot bowed low.
"Monsieur," he said once more, "it is a matter for my eternal regret that I am forced to intrude even for a moment upon an assignation so romantic. But there is a little matter which must first be settled. I have some friends here who have a thing to say to you."
He walked softly, with catlike tread, along by the wall to where the thick curtains shut out the inner apartment. He caught at the thick velvet, dragged it back, and the two rooms were suddenly flooded with light. In the recently discovered one, two stalwart-looking men in plain clothes, but of very unmistakable appearance, were standing waiting. Guillot staggered back. They were strangers to him. He was like a man who looks upon a nightmare. His eyes protruded. The words which he tried to utter failed him. Then, with a swift, nervous presentiment, he turned quickly around towards the man who had been standing in the shadows. Here, too, the unexpected had happened. It was Peter, Baron de Grost, who threw his muffler and broad-brimmed hat upon the table.
"Five minutes to eleven, I believe, Monsieur Guillot," Peter declared. "I win by an hour and five minutes."
Guillot said nothing for several seconds. After all, though, he had great gifts. He recovered alike his power of speech and his composure.
"These gentlemen," he said, pointing with his left hand towards the inner room. "I do not understand their presence in my apartments."
Peter shrugged his shoulders.
"They represent, I am afraid, the obvious end of things," he explained. "You have given me a run for my money, I confess. A Monsieur Guillot who is remarkably like you still occupies your box at the Empire, and Mademoiselle Jeanne Lemère, the accomplished understudy of the lady who has just left us, is sufficiently like the incomparable Louise to escape, perhaps, detection for the first few minutes. But you gave the game away a little, my dear Guillot, when you allowed your quarry to come and gaze even from the shadows of his box at the woman he adored."
"Where is—he?" Guillot faltered.
"He is on his way back to his country home," Peter replied. "I think that he will be cured of his infatuation for Mademoiselle. The assassins whom you planted in that room are by this time in Bow Street. The price which others beside you knew, my dear Guillot, was placed upon that unfortunate young man's head will not pass this time into your pocket. For the rest——"
"The rest is of no consequence," Guillot interrupted, bowing. "I admit that I am vanquished. As for those gentlemen there," he added, waving his hand towards the two men, who had taken a step forward, "I have a little oath which is sacred to me concerning them. I take the liberty, therefore, to admit myself defeated, Monsieur le Baron, and to take my leave."
No one was quick enough to interfere. They had only a glimpse of him as he stood there with the revolver pressed to his temple, an impression of a sharp report, of Guillot staggering back as the revolver slipped from his fingers on to the floor. Even his death cry was stifled. They carried him away without any fuss, and Peter was just in time, after all, to see the finish of the second act of the ballet. The sham Monsieur Guillot still smirked at the sham Louise, but the box by his side was empty.
"Is it over?" Violet asked breathlessly.
"It is over," Peter answered.
It was, after all, an unrecorded tragedy. In an obscure corner of the morning papers one learned the next day that a Frenchman, who had apparently come to the end of his means, had committed suicide in a furnished flat in Shaftesbury Avenue. Two foreigners were deported without having been brought up for trial, for being suspected persons. A little languid interest was aroused at the inquest when one of the witnesses deposed to the deceased having been a famous French criminal. Nothing further transpired, however, and the readers of the halfpenny press for once were deprived of their sensation. For the rest, Peter received, with much satisfaction, a remarkably handsome signet ring, bearing some famous arms, and a telegram from Sogrange: "Well done, Baron! May the successful termination of your enterprise nerve you for the greater undertaking which is close at hand. I leave for London by the night train.—Sogrange."
The Marquis de Sogrange arrived in Berkeley Square with the grey dawn of an October morning, showing in his appearance and dress few enough signs of his night journey. Yet he had travelled without stopping from Paris by fast motor car and the mail boat.
"They telephoned me from Charing Cross," Peter said, "that you could not possibly arrive until midday. The clerk assured me that no train had yet reached Calais."
"They had reason in what they told you," Sogrange remarked, as he leaned back in a chair and sipped the coffee which had been waiting for him in the Baron de Grost's study. "The train itself never got more than a mile away from the Gare du Nord. The engine-driver was shot through the head, and the metals were torn from the way. Paris is within a year now of a second and more terrible revolution."
"You really believe this?" Peter asked gravely.
"It is a certainty," Sogrange replied. "Not I alone, but many others can see this clearly. Everywhere the Socialists have wormed themselves into places of trust. They are to be met with in every rank of life, under every form of disguise. The post-office strike has already shown us what deplorable disasters even a skirmish can bring about. To-day the railway strike has paralysed France. Our country lies to-day absolutely at the mercy of any invader. As it happens, no one is, for the moment, prepared. Who can tell how it may be next time?"
"This is bad news," Peter declared. "If this is really the position of affairs, the matter is much more serious than the newspapers would have us believe."
"The newspapers," Sogrange muttered, "ignore what lies behind. Some of them, I think, are paid to do it. As for the rest, our Press had always an ostrich-like tendency. The Frenchman of the café does not buy his journal to be made sad."
"You believe, then," Peter asked, "that these strikes have some definite tendency?"
Sogrange set down his cup and smiled bitterly. In the early sunlight, still a little cold and unloving, Peter could see that there was a change in the man. He was no longer the debonair aristocrat of the racecourses and the boulevards. The shadows under his eyes were deeper, his cheeks more sunken. He had lost something of the sprightliness of his bearing. His attitude, indeed, was almost dejected. He was like a man who sees into the future and finds there strange and gruesome things.
"I do more than believe that," he declared. "I know it. It has fallen to my lot to make a very definite discovery concerning them. Listen, my friend. For more than six months the Government has been trying to discover the source of this stream of vile socialistic literature which has contaminated the French working classes. The pamphlets have been distributed with devilish ingenuity amongst all national operatives, the army and the navy. The Government has failed. The Double Four has succeeded."
"You have really discovered their source?" Peter exclaimed.
"Without a doubt," Sogrange assented. "The Government appealed to us first some months ago when I was in America. For a time we had no success. Then a clue, and the rest was easy. The navy, the army, the post-office employees, the telegraph and telephone operators, and the railway men, have been the chief recipients of this incessant stream of foul literature. To-day one cannot tell how much mischief has been actually done. The strikes which have already occurred are only the mutterings of the coming storm. But mark you, wherever those pamphlets have gone, trouble has followed. What men may do the Government is doing, but all the time the poison is at work, the seed has been sown. Two millions of money have been spent to corrupt that very class which should be the backbone of France. Through the fingers of one man has come this shower of gold, one man alone has stood at the head of the great organisation which has disseminated this loathsome disease. Behind him—well, we know."
"The man?"
"It is fitting that you should ask that question," Sogrange replied. "The name of that man is Bernadine, Count von Hern."
Peter remained speechless. There was something almost terrible in the slow preciseness with which Sogrange had uttered the name of his enemy, something unspeakably threatening in the cold glitter of his angry eyes.
"Up to the present," Sogrange continued, "I have watched—sympathetically, of course, but with a certain amount of amusement—the duel between you and Bernadine. It has been against your country and your country's welfare that most of his efforts have been directed, which perhaps accounts for the equanimity with which I have been contented to remain a looker-on. It is apparent, my dear Baron, that in most of your encounters the honours have remained with you. Yet, as it has chanced, never once has Bernadine been struck a real and crushing blow. The time has come when this and more must happen. It is no longer a matter of polite exchanges. It is aduel à outrance."
"You mean——" Peter began.
"I mean that Bernadine must die," Sogrange declared.
There was a brief silence. Outside, the early morning street noises were increasing in volume as the great army of workers, streaming towards the heart of the city from a hundred suburbs, passed on to their tasks. A streak of sunshine had found its way into the room, lay across the carpet, and touched Sogrange's still, waxen features. Peter glanced half fearfully at his friend and visitor. He himself was no coward, no shrinker from the great issues. He, too, had dealt in life and death. Yet there was something in the deliberate preciseness of Sogrange's words, as he sat there only a few feet away, which was unspeakably thrilling. It was like a death sentence pronounced in all solemnity upon some shivering criminal. There was something inevitable and tragical about the whole affair. A pronouncement had been made from which there was no appeal. Bernadine was to die!
"Isn't this a little exceeding the usual exercise of our powers?" Peter asked slowly.
"No such occasion as this has ever yet arisen," Sogrange reminded him. "Bernadine has fled to this country with barely an hour to spare. His offence is extraditable by a law of the last century which has never been repealed. He is guilty of treason against the Republic of France. Yet they do not want him back, they do not want a trial. I have papers upon my person which, if I took them into an English court, would procure for me a warrant for Bernadine's arrest. It is not this we desire. Bernadine must die. No fate could be too terrible for a man who has striven to corrupt the soul of a nation. It is not war, this. It is not honest conspiracy. Is it war, I ask you, to seek to poison the drinking water of an enemy, to send stalking into their midst some loathsome disease? Such things belong to the ages of barbarity. Bernadine has striven to revive them, and Bernadine shall die."
"It is justice," Peter admitted.
"The question remains," Sogrange continued, "by whose hand—yours or mine?"
Peter started uneasily.
"Is that necessary?" he asked.
"I fear that it is," Sogrange replied. "We had a brief meeting of the executive council last night, and it was decided, for certain reasons, to entrust this task into no other hands. You will smile when I tell you that these accursed pamphlets have found their way into the possession of many of the rank and file of our own order. There is a marked disinclination on the part of those who have been our slaves to accept orders from anyone. Espionage we can still command—the best, perhaps, in Europe—because here we use a different class of material. But of those underneath we are, for the moment, doubtful. Paris is all in a ferment. Under its outward seemliness a million throats are ready to take up the brazen cry of revolution. One trusts nobody. One fears all the time."
"You or I!" Peter repeated slowly. "It will not be sufficient, then, that we find Bernadine and deliver him over to your country's laws?"
"It will not be sufficient," Sogrange answered sternly. "From those he may escape. For him there must be no escape."
"Sogrange," Peter said, speaking in a low tone, "I have never yet killed a human being."
"Nor I," Sogrange admitted. "Nor have I yet set my heel upon its head and stamped the life from a rat upon the pavement. But one lives and one moves on. Bernadine is the enemy of your country and mine. He makes war after the fashion of vermin. No ordinary cut-throat would succeed against him. It must be you or I."
"How shall we decide?" Peter asked.
"The spin of a coin," Sogrange replied. "It is best that way. It is best, too, done quickly."
Peter produced a sovereign from his pocket and balanced it on the palm of his hand.
"Let it be understood," Sogrange continued, "that this is a dual undertaking. We toss only for the final honour—for the last stroke. If the choice falls upon me, I shall count upon you to help me to the end. If it falls upon you, I shall be at your right hand even when you strike the blow."
"It is agreed," Peter said. "See, it is for you to call."
He threw the coin high into the air.
"I call heads," Sogrange decided.
It fell upon the table. Peter covered it with his hand, and then slowly withdrew the fingers. A little shiver ran through his veins. The harmless head that looked up at him was like the figure of death. It was for him to strike the blow!
"Where is Bernadine now?" he asked.
"Get me a morning paper and I will tell you," Sogrange declared, rising. "He was in the train which was stopped outside the Gare du Nord, on his way to England. What became of the passengers I have not heard. I knew what was likely to happen, and I left an hour before in a 100 h.p. Charron."
Peter rang the bell, and ordered the servant who answered it to procure theDaily Telegraph. As soon as it arrived, he spread it open upon the table, and Sogrange looked over his shoulder. These are the headings which they saw in large black characters:
Peter's forefinger travelled down the page swiftly. It paused at the following paragraph:—
"The 8.55 train from the Gare du Nord, carrying many passengers for London, after being detained within a mile of Paris for over an hour owing to the murder of the engine-driver, made an attempt last night to proceed, with terrible results. Near Chantilly, whilst travelling at over fifty miles an hour, the points were tampered with, and the express dashed into a goods train laden with minerals. Very few particulars are yet to hand, but the express was completely wrecked, and many lives have been lost. Amongst the dead are the following:"
One by one Peter read out the names. Then he stopped short. A little exclamation broke from Sogrange's lips. The thirteenth name upon that list of dead was the name of Bernadine, Count von Hern.
"Bernadine!" Peter faltered. "Bernadine is dead!"
"Killed by the strikers!" Sogrange echoed. "It is a just thing, this."
The two men looked down at the paper and then up at each other. A strange silence seemed to have found its way into the room. The shadow of death lay between them. Peter touched his forehead and found it wet.
"It is a just thing, indeed," he repeated, "but justice and death are alike terrible."
Late in the afternoon of the same day a motor car, splashed with mud, drew up before the door of the house in Berkeley Square. Sogrange, who was standing talking to Peter before the library window, suddenly broke off in the middle of a sentence. He stepped back into the room and gripped his friend's shoulder.
"It is the Baroness," he exclaimed quickly. "What does she want here?"
"The Baroness who?" Peter demanded.
"The Baroness von Ratten. You must have heard of her—she is the friend of Bernadine."
The two men had been out to lunch at the Ritz with Violet, and had walked across the Park home. Sogrange had been drawing on his gloves in the act of starting out for a call at the Embassy.
"Does your wife know this woman?" he asked.
Peter shook his head.
"I think not," he replied. "We shall know in a minute."
"Then she has come to see you," Sogrange continued. "What does it mean, I wonder?"
Peter shrugged his shoulders.
There was a knock at the door, and his servant entered, bearing a card.
"This lady would like to see you, sir, on important business," he said.
"You can show her in here," Peter directed.
There was a very short delay. The two men had no time to exchange a word. They heard the rustling of a woman's gown, and immediately afterward the perfume of violets seemed to fill the room.
"The Baroness von Ratten," the butler announced.
The door closed behind her. The servant had disappeared. Peter advanced to meet his guest. She was a little above medium height, very slim, with extraordinarily fair hair, colourless face, and strange eyes. She was not strictly beautiful, and yet there was no man upon whom her presence was without its effect. Her voice was like her movements, slow, and with a grace of its own.
"You do not mind that I have come to see you?" she asked, raising her eyes to Peter's. "I believe before I go that you will think terrible things of me, but you must not begin before I have told you my errand. It has been a great struggle with me before I made up my mind to come here."
"Won't you sit down, Baroness?" Peter invited.
She saw Sogrange, and hesitated.
"You are not alone," she said softly. "I wish to speak with you alone."
"Permit me to present to you the Marquis de Sogrange," Peter begged. "He is my oldest friend, Baroness. I think that whatever you might have to say to me you might very well say before him."
"It is—of a private nature," she murmured.
"The Marquis and I have no secrets," Peter declared, "either political or private."
She sat down and motioned Peter to take a place by her side upon the sofa.