The great house in Curzon Street awoke, the following morning, to a state of intense activity. Taxi-cabs and motor-cars were lined along the street; a stream of callers came and went. That part of the establishment of which little was seen by the casual caller, the rooms where half a dozen secretaries conducted an immense correspondence, presided over by Li Wen, was working overtime at full pressure. In his reception room, Prince Shan saw a selected few of the callers, mostly journalists and politicians, to whom Li Wen gave the entrée. One visitor even this most astute of secretaries found it hard to place. He took the card in to his master, who glanced at it thoughtfully.
"The Earl of Dorminster," he repeated. "I will see him."
Nigel found himself received with courtesy, yet with a certain aloofness. Prince Shan rose from his favourite chair of plain black oak heaped with green silk cushions and held out his hand a little tentatively.
"You are very kind to visit me, Lord Dorminster," he said. "I trust that you come to wish me fortune."
"That," Nigel replied, "depends upon how you choose to seek it."
"I am answered," was the prompt acknowledgment. "One thing in your country I have at least learnt to appreciate, and that is your love of candour. What is your errand with me to-day? Have you come to speak to me as an ambassador from your cousin, or in any way on her behalf?"
"My business has nothing to do with Lady Maggie," Nigel assured him gravely.
Prince Shan held out his hand.
"Stop," he begged. "Do not explain your business. If it is a personal request, it is granted. If, on the other hand, you seek my advice on matters of grave importance, it is yours. Before other words are spoken, however, I myself desire to address you on the subject of Lady Maggie Trent."
"As you please," Nigel answered.
"It is not the custom of my country, or of my life," Prince Shan continued, "to covet or steal the things which belong to another. If fate has made me a thief, I am very sorry. I have proposed to Lady Maggie that she accompany me back to China. It is my great desire that she should become my wife."
Nigel felt himself curiously tongue-tied. There was something in the other's measured speech, so fateful, so assured, that it seemed almost as though he were speaking of pre-ordained things. Much that had seemed to him impossible and unnatural in such an idea disappeared from that moment.
"You tell me this," Nigel began—
"I announce it to you as the head of the family," Prince Shan interrupted.
"You tell it to me also," Nigel persisted, "because you have heard the rumours which were at one time very prevalent—that Lady Maggie and I were or were about to become engaged to be married."
"I have heard such a rumour only very indirectly," Prince Shan confessed, "and I cannot admit that it has made any difference in my attitude. I think, in my land and yours, we have at least one common convention. The woman who touches our heart is ours if we may win her. Love is unalterably selfish. One must fight for one's own hand. And for those who may suffer by our victory, we may have pity but no consideration."
"Am I to understand," Nigel asked bluntly, "that Lady Maggie has consented to be your wife?"
"Lady Maggie has given me no reply. I left her alone with her thoughts. Every hour it is my hope to hear from her. She knows that I leave for China early to-morrow."
"So at the present moment you are in suspense."
"I am in suspense," Prince Shan admitted, "and perhaps," he went on, with one of his rare smiles, "it occurred to me that it would be in one sense a relief to speak to a fellow man of the hopes and fears that are in my heart. You are the one person to whom I could speak, Lord Dorminster. You have not wished my suit well, but at least you have been clear-sighted. I think it has never occurred to you that a prince of China might venture to compete with a peer of England."
"On the contrary," Nigel assented, "I have the greatest admiration for the few living descendants of the world's oldest aristocracy. You have a right to enter the lists, a right to win if you can."
"And what do you think of my prospects, if I may ask such a delicate question?" Prince Shan enquired.
"I cannot estimate them," Nigel replied. "I only know that Maggie is deeply interested."
"I think," his companion continued softly, "that she will become my Princess. You have never visited China, Lord Dorminster," he went on, "so you have little idea, perhaps, as to the manner of our lives. Some day I will hope to be your host, so until then, as I may not speak of my own possessions, may I go just so far as this? Your cousin will be very happy in China. This is a great country, but the very air you breathe is cloyed with your national utilitarianism. Mine is a country of beautiful thoughts, of beautiful places, of quiet-living and sedate people. I can give your cousin every luxury of which the world has ever dreamed, wrapped and enshrined in beauty. No person with a soul could be unhappy in the places where she will dwell."
"You are at least confident," Nigel remarked.
"It is because I am convinced," was the calm rejoinder. "I shall take your cousin's happiness into my keeping without one shadow of misgiving. The last word, however, is with her. It remains to be seen whether her courage is great enough to induce her to face such a complete change in the manner of her life."
"It will not be her lack of courage which will keep her in England," Nigel declared.
Prince Shan bowed, with a graceful little gesture of the hands. The subject was finished.
"I shall now, Lord Dorminster," he said, "take advantage of your kindly presence here to speak to you on a very personal matter, only this time it is you who are the central figure, and I who am the dummy."
"I do not follow you," Nigel confessed, with a slight frown.
"I speak in tones of apology," Prince Shan went on, "but you must remember that I am one of reflective disposition; Nature has endowed me with some of the gifts of my great ancestors, philosophers famed the world over. It seems very clear to me that, if I had not come, from sheer force of affectionate propinquity you would have married Lady Maggie."
Nigel's frown deepened.
"Prince Shan!" he began.
Again the outstretched hand seemed as though the fingers were pressed against his mouth. He broke off abruptly in his protest.
"You would have lived a contented life, because that is your province," his companion continued. "You would have felt yourself happy because you would have been a faithful husband. But the time would have come when you would both have realised that you had missed the great things."
"This is idle prophecy," Nigel observed, a little impatiently. "I came to see you upon another matter."
"Humour me," the Prince begged. "I am going to speak to you even more intimately. I shall venture to do so because, after all, she is better known to me than to you. I am going to tell you that of all the women in the world, Naida Karetsky is the most likely to make you happy."
Nigel drew himself up a little stiffly.
"One does not discuss these things," he muttered.
"May I call that a touch of insularity?" Prince Shan pleaded, "because there is nothing else in the world so wonderful to discuss, in all respect and reverence, as the women who have made us feel. One last word, Lord Dorminster. The days of matrimonial alliances between the reigning families of Europe have come to an end under the influence of a different form of government, but there is a certain type of alliance, the utility of which remains unimpaired. I venture to say that you could not do your country a greater service, apart from any personal feelings you might have, than by marrying Mademoiselle Karetsky. There, you see, now I have finished. This is for your reflection, Lord Dorminster—just the measured statement of one who wears at least the cloak of philosophy by inheritance. Time passes. Your own reason for coming to see me has not yet been expounded."
"I have come to ask you to visit the Prime Minister before you leave England," Nigel announced.
Prince Shan changed his position slightly. His forehead was a little wrinkled. He was silent for a moment.
"If I pay more than a farewell visit of ceremony," he said, "that is to say, if I speak with Mr. Mervin Brown on things that count, I must anticipate a certain decision at which I have not yet wholly arrived."
Nigel had a sudden inspiration.
"You are seeking to bribe Maggie!" he exclaimed.
"That is not true," was the dignified reply.
"Then please explain," Nigel persisted.
Prince Shan rose to his feet. He walked to the heavy silk curtains which led into his own bedchamber, pushed them apart, and looked for a moment at the familiar objects in the room. Then he came back, glancing on his way at the ebony cabinet.
"One does not repeat one's mistakes," he said slowly, "and although you and I, Lord Dorminster, breathe the common air of the greater world, my instinct tells me that of certain things which have passed between your cousin and myself it is better that no mention ever be made. I wish to tell you this, however. There is in existence a document, my signature to which would, without a doubt, have a serious influence upon the destinies of this country. That document, unsigned, would be one of my marriage gifts to Lady Maggie—and as you know I have not yet had her answer. However, if you wish it, I will go to the Prime Minister."
Li Wen came silently in. He spoke to his master for a few minutes in Chinese. A faint smile parted the latter's lips.
"You can tell the person at the telephone that I will call within the next few minutes," he directed. "You will not object," he added, turning courteously to Nigel, "if I stop for a moment, on the way to Downing Street, at a small private hospital? An acquaintance of mine lies sick there and desires urgently to see me."
"I am entirely at your service," Nigel assured him.
Prince Shan, with many apologies, left Nigel alone in the car outside a tall, grey house in John Street, and, preceded by the white-capped nurse who had opened the door, climbed the stairs to the first floor of the celebrated nursing home, where, after a moment's delay, he was shown into a large and airy apartment. Immelan was in bed, looking very ill indeed. He was pale, and his china-blue eyes, curiously protruding, were filled with an expression of haunting fear. A puzzled doctor was standing by the bedside. A nurse, who was smoothing the bedclothes, glanced around at Prince Shan's entrance. The invalid started convulsively, and, clutching the pillows with his right hand, turned towards his visitor.
"So you've come!" he exclaimed. "Stay where yon are! Don't go! Doctor—nurse—leave us alone for a moment."
The nurse went at once. The doctor hesitated.
"My patient is a good deal exhausted," he said. "There are no dangerous symptoms at present, but—"
"I will promise not to distress him," Prince Shan interrupted. "I am myself somewhat pressed for time, and it is probable that your patient will insist upon speaking to me in private."
The doctor followed the nurse from the room. Prince Shan stood looking down upon the figure of quondam associate. There was a leaven of mild wonder in his clear eyes, a faintly contemptuous smile about the corners of his lips.
"So you are afraid of death, my friend," he observed, "afraid of the death you planned so skilfully for me."
"It is a lie!" Immelan declared excitedly. "Sen Lu was never killed by my orders. Listen! You have nothing against me. My death can do you no good. It is you who have been at fault. You—Prince Shan—the great diplomatist of the world—are gambling away your future and the future of a mighty empire for a woman's sake. You have treated me badly enough. Spare my life. Call in the doctor here and tell him what to do. He can find nothing in my system. He is helpless."
The smile upon the Prince's lips became vaguer, his expression more bland and indeterminate.
"My dear Immelan," he murmured, "you are without doubt delirious. Compose yourself, I beg."
A light that was almost tragic shone in the man's face. He sat up with a sudden access of strength.
"For the love of God, don't torture me!" he groaned. "The pains grow worse, hour by hour. If I die, the whole world shall know by whose hand."
The expression on Prince Shan's face remained unchanged. In his eyes, however, there was a little glint of something which seemed almost like foreknowledge,
"When you die," he pronounced calmly, "it will be by your own hand—not mine."
For some reason or other, Immelan accepted these measured words of prophecy as a total reprieve. The relief in his face was almost piteous. He seized his visitor's hand and would have fawned upon it. Prince Shan withdrew himself a little farther from the bed.
"Immelan," he said, "during my stay in England I have studied you and your methods, I have listened to all you have had to say and to propose, I have weighed the advantages and the disadvantages of the scheme you have outlined to me, and I only arrived at my decision after the most serious and unbiassed reflection. Your scheme itself was bold and almost splendid, but, as you yourself well know at the back of your mind, it would lay the seeds of a world tumult. I have studied history, Immelan, perhaps a little more deeply than you, and I do not believe in conquests. For the restoration to China of such lands as belong geographically and rightly to the Chinese Empire, I have my own plans. You, it seems to me, would make a cat's-paw of all Asia to gratify your hatred of England."
"A cat's-paw!" Immelan gasped. "Australia, New Zealand and India for Japan, new lands for her teeming population; Thibet for you, all Manchuria, and the control of the Siberian Railway!"
"These are dazzling propositions," Prince Shan admitted, "and yet—what about the other side of the Pacific?"
"America would be powerless," Immelan insisted.
"So you said before, in 1917," was the dry reminder. "I did not come here, however, to talk world politics with you. Those things for the moment are finished. I came in answer to your summons."
Immelan raised himself a little in the bed.
"You meant what you said?" he demanded, with hoarse anxiety. "There was no poison? Swear that?"
Prince Shan moved towards the door. His backward glance was coldly contemptuous.
"What I said, I meant," he replied. "Extract such comfort from it as you may."
He left the room, closing the door softly behind him. Immelan stared after him, hollow-eyed and anxious. Already the cold fears were seizing upon him once more.
Prince Shan rejoined Nigel, and the two men drove off to Downing Street. The former was silent for the first few minutes. Then he turned slightly towards his companion.
"The man Immelan is a coward," he declared. "It is he whom I have just visited."
Nigel shrugged his shoulders.
"So many men are brave enough in a fight," he remarked, "who lose their nerve on a sick bed."
"Bravery in battle," Prince Shan pronounced, "is the lowest form of courage. The blood is stirred by the excitement of slaughter as by alcohol. With Immelan I shall have no more dealings."
"Speaking politically as well as personally?" Nigel enquired.
The other smiled.
"I think I might go so far as to agree," he acquiesced, "but in a sense, there are conditions. You shall hear what they are. I will speak before you to the Prime Minister. See, up above is the sign of my departure."
Out of a little bank of white, fleecy clouds which hung down, here and there, from the blue sky, came theBlack Dragon, her engines purring softly, her movements slow and graceful. Both men watched her for a moment in silence.
"At six o'clock to-morrow morning I start," Prince Shan announced. "My pilot tells me that the weather conditions are wonderful, all the way from here to Pekin. We shall be there on Wednesday."
"You travel alone?" Nigel enquired.
"I have passengers," was the quiet reply. "I am taking the English chaplain to your Church in Pekin."
The eyes of the two men met.
"It is an ingenious idea," Nigel admitted dryly.
"I wish to be prepared," his companion answered. "It may be that he is my only companion. In that case, I go back to a life lonelier than I have ever dreamed of. It is on the knees of the gods. So far there has come no word, but although I am not by nature an optimist, my superstitions are on my side. All the way over on my last voyage, when I lay in my berth, awake and we sailed over and through the clouds, my star, my own particular star, seemed leaning always down towards me, and for that reason I have faith."
Nigel glanced at his companion curiously but without speech. The car pulled up in Downing Street. The two men descended and found everything made easy for them. In two minutes they were in the presence of the Prime Minister.
Mr. Mervin Brown was at his best in the interview to which he had, as a matter of fact, been looking forward with much trepidation. He received Prince Shan courteously and reproached him for not having paid him an earlier visit. To the latter's request that Nigel might be permitted to be present at the discussion, he promptly acquiesced.
"Lord Dorminster and I have already had some conversation," he said, "bearing upon the matter about which I desire to talk to you."
"I have found his lordship," Prince Shan declared, "one of the few Englishmen who has any real apprehension of the trend of events outside his own country."
The Prime Minister plunged at once into the middle of things.
"Our national faults are without doubt known to you, Prince Shan," he said. "They include, amongst other things, an over-confidence in the promises of others; too great belief, I fear, in the probity of our friends. We paid a staggering price in 1914 for those qualities. Lord Dorminster would have me believe that there is a still more terrible price for us to pay in the future, unless we change our whole outlook, abandon our belief in the League of Nations, and once more acknowledge the supremacy of force."
"Lord Dorminster is right," Prince Shan pronounced. "I have come here to tell you so, Mr. Mervin Brown."
"You come here as a friend of England?" the latter asked.
"I come here as one who hesitates to become her enemy," was the measured reply. "I will be perfectly frank with you, sir. I came to this country to discuss a project which, with the acquiescence of China and Japan, would have resulted in the humiliation of your country and the gratification of Germany's eagerly desired revenge."
"You believe in the existence of that sentiment, then?" the Prime Minister enquired.
"Any one short of a very insular Englishman," the Prince replied, "would have realised it long ago. There is a great society in Germany, scarcely even a secret society, pledged to wipe out the humiliations of the last great war. Lord Dorminster tells me that you are to-day without a secret service. For that reason you have remained in ignorance of the mines beneath your feet. Germany has laid her plans well and carefully. Her first and greatest weapon has been your sense of security. She has seen you contemplate with an ill-advised smile of spurious satisfaction, invincible France, regaining her wealth more slowly than you for the simple reason that half the man power of the country is absorbed by her military preparations. France is impregnable. A direct invasion of your country is in all probability impossible. Those two facts have seemed to you all-sufficient. That is where you have been, if I may say so, sir, very short-sighted."
"Germany has no power to transport troops in other directions," Mr. Mervin Brown observed.
Prince Shan smiled.
"You have another enemy besides Germany," he pointed out, "a great democracy who has never forgiven your lack of sympathy at her birth, your attempts to repress by force a great upheaval, borne in agony and shame, yet containing the germs of worthy things which your statesmen in those days failed to discern. Russia has never forgiven. Russia stands hand in hand with Germany."
"But surely," the Prime Minister protested, "you speak in the language of the past? The League of Nations still exists. Any directly predatory expedition would bring the rest of the world to arms."
Prince Shan shook his head.
"One of the first necessities of a tribunal," he expounded, "is that that tribunal should have the power to punish. You yourself are one of the judges. You might find your culprit guilty. With what weapon will you chastise him? The culprit has grown mightier than the judge."
"America—"
"America," Prince Shan interrupted, "can, when she chooses, strike a weightier blow than any other nation on earth, but she will never again proceed outside her own sphere of influence."
"But she must protect her trade," the Prime Minister insisted.
"She has no need to do so by force of arms. Take my own country, for instance. We need American machinery, American goods, locomotives and mining plants. America has no need to force these things upon us. We are as anxious to buy as she is to sell."
"I am to figure to myself, then," Mr. Mervin Brown reflected, "a combination of Germany and Russia engaged in some scheme inimical to Great Britain?"
"There was such a scheme definitely arranged and planned," Prince Shan assured him gravely. "If I had seen well to sign a certain paper, you would have lost, before the end of this month, India, your great treasure house, Australia and New Zealand, and eventually Egypt. You would have been as powerless to prevent it as either of us three would be if called upon unarmed to face the champion heavyweight boxer."
"It is hard for me to credit the fact that officially Germany has any knowledge of this scheme," the Prime Minister confessed.
"Official Germany would probably deny it," Prince Shan answered dryly. "Official Russia might do the same. Official China would follow suit, but the real China, in my person, assures you of the truth of what I have told you. You have never heard, I suppose, of the three secret cities?"
"I have heard stories about them which sounded like fairy tales," Mr. Mervin Brown admitted grudgingly.
"Nevertheless, they exist," Prince Shan continued, "and they exist for the purpose of supplying means of offence for the expedition of which I have spoken. There is one in Germany, one in Russia, and one in China. The three between them have produced enough armoured airships of a new design to conquer any country in the world."
"Armoured airships?" Mr. Mervin Brown repeated.
"Airships from which one fights on land as well as in the air," Prince Shan explained. "On land they become moving fortresses. No shell has ever been made which can destroy them. I should be revealing no secret to you, because I believe I am right in saying, sir, that a model of these amazing engines of destruction was first submitted to your Government."
"I remember something of the sort," the Prime Minister assented. "The inventor himself was an American, I believe."
"Precisely! I believe he told you in plain words that whoever possessed his model might, if they chose, dominate the world."
"But who wants to dominate the world by force?" Mr. Mervin Brown demanded passionately. "We have passed into a new era, an era of peace and the higher fellowship. It is waste of time, labour and money to create these horrible instruments of destruction. The League of Nations has decreed that they shall not be built."
"Nevertheless," Prince Shan declared, with portentous gravity, "a thousand of these engines of destruction are now ready in a certain city of China. Each one of the three secret cities has done its quota of work in the shape of providing parts. China alone has put them together. I bought the secret, and I alone possess it. It rests with me whether the world remains at peace or moves on to war."
"You cannot hesitate, then?" Mr. Mervin Brown exclaimed anxiously. "You yourself are an apostle of civilisation."
Prince Shan smiled.
"It is because we are strong," he said, "that we love peace. It is because you are weak that you fear war. I am not here to teach you statesmanship. It is not for me to point out to you the means by which you can make your country safe and keep her people free. Call a meeting of what remains of the League of Nations and compare your strength with that of the nations who have crept outside and lie waiting. Then take the advice of experts and set your house in order. You sacrifice everything to-day to the god of commerce. Take a few men like Dorminster here into your councils. You are not a nation of fools. Speak the truth at the next meeting of the League of Nations and see that it is properly reported. Help yourselves, and I will help you."
"Will you come into my Cabinet, Lord Dorminster?" the Prime Minister invited, turning to Nigel.
"If you will recreate the post of Minister for War, I will do so with pleasure," was the prompt reply.
Prince Shan held out his hand.
"There is great responsibility upon your shoulders, Mr. Mervin Brown," he said. "You will never know how near you have been to disaster. Try and wake up your nation gradually, if you can. Call together your writers, your thinking men, your historians. Encourage the flagging spirit of patriotism in your public schools and universities. Is this presumption on my part that I give so much advice? If so, forgive me. Truth that sits in the heart will sometimes demand to be heard."
At the Prime Minister's request, Nigel remained behind. They both looked at the door through which Prince Shan had passed. Mr. Mervin Brown metaphorically pinched himself. He was still feeling a little dazed.
"Is that man real flesh and blood?" he demanded.
"He is as real and as near the truth," Nigel replied solemnly, "as the things of which he has told us."
That night, Nigel gave a dinner party on Maggie's account at the fashionable London hotel of the moment. Invitations had been sent out by telephone, by hurried notes, in one or two cases were delivered by word of mouth. On the whole, the acceptances, considering the season was in full swing, were a little remarkable. Every one was anxious to come, because, as one of her girl friends put it, no one ever knew what Maggie was going to be up to next. One of the few refusals came from Prince Shan, and even he made use of compromise:
My dear Lord Dorminster, will you forgive me if in this instance I do not break a custom to which I have perhaps a little too rigidly adhered. The Prime Minister telephoned, a few minutes after we left him, asking me to meet two of his colleagues from the Foreign Office to-night, and I doubt whether our conference will have concluded at the hour you name.However, if you will permit me, I will give myself the pleasure of joining you later in the evening, to make my adieux to those of my friends whom I am quite sure I shall find amongst your company.Sincerely yours,SHAN.
My dear Lord Dorminster, will you forgive me if in this instance I do not break a custom to which I have perhaps a little too rigidly adhered. The Prime Minister telephoned, a few minutes after we left him, asking me to meet two of his colleagues from the Foreign Office to-night, and I doubt whether our conference will have concluded at the hour you name.
However, if you will permit me, I will give myself the pleasure of joining you later in the evening, to make my adieux to those of my friends whom I am quite sure I shall find amongst your company.
Sincerely yours,
SHAN.
Maggie passed the note back with a little smile. She made no comment whatever. Nigel watched her thoughtfully.
"I have carried out your orders," he observed. "Everything has been attended to, even to the colour of your table decorations. Now tell me what it all means?"
She looked him in the face quite frankly.
"How can I?" she answered. "I do not know myself."
"Is this by way of being a farewell party?" he persisted.
"I do not know that," she assured him. "The only thing is that if I do decide—to go—well, I shall have had a last glimpse of most of my friends."
"As your nearest male relative, in fact your guardian," Nigel went on, with a touch of his old manner, "I feel myself deeply interested in your present situation. If a little advice from one who is considerably your senior would be acceptable—"
"It wouldn't," Maggie interrupted quietly. "There are just two things in life no girl accepts advice upon—the way she does her hair and the man she means to marry. You see, both are decided by instinct. I shall know before dawn to-morrow what I mean to do, but until then nothing that anybody could say would make any difference. Besides, your mind ought to be full of your own matrimonial affairs. I hear that Naida is talking of going back to Russia next week."
"My own affairs are less complex," Nigel replied. "I am going to ask Naida to marry me—to-night if I have the opportunity."
Maggie made a little grimace.
"There goes my second string!" she exclaimed. "Nigel, you are horribly callous. I have never been in the least sure that I haven't wanted to marry you myself."
Nigel lit a cigarette and pushed the box across to his companion.
"I've frequently felt the same way," he confessed. "The trouble of it is that when the really right person comes along, one hasn't any doubt about it whatever. I should have made you a stodgy husband, Maggie."
She sniffed.
"I think that considering the way you've flirted with me," she declared, "you ought at least to have given me the opportunity of refusing you."
"If Naida refuses me," he began—
"And I decide that Asia is too far away," she interrupted—
"We may come together, after all," he said, with a resigned little sigh.
"Glib tongue and empty heart," she quoted. "Nigel, I would never trust you. I believe you're in love with Naida."
"And I'm not quite so sure about you," he observed, watching the colour rise quickly in her cheeks. "Off with you to dress, young woman. It's past seven, and we must be there early. I still have the wine to order."
The dinner party was in its way a complete success. Prince Karschoff was there, benign and distinguished; Chalmers and one or two other young men from the American Embassy. There was a sprinkling of Maggie's girl friends, a leaven of the older world in Nigel's few intimates,—and Naida, very pale but more beautiful than ever in a white velvet gown, her hair brushed straight back, and with no jewellery save one long rope of pearls. Nigel who in his capacity as host had found little time for personal conversation during the service of dinner, deliberately led her a little apart when they passed out into the lounge for coffee and to watch the dancing.
"My duties are over for a time," he said. "Do you realise that I have not had a word with you alone since our luncheon at Ciro's?"
"We have all been a little engrossed, have we not?" she murmured. "I hope that you are satisfied with the way things have turned out."
"Nothing shall induce me to talk politics or empire-saving to-night," he declared, with a smile. "I have other things to say."
"Tell me why you asked us all to dine so suddenly," she enquired. "I do not know whether it is my fancy, but there seems to be an air of celebration about. Is there any announcement to be made?"
He shook his head.
"None. The party was just a whim of Maggie's."
They both looked across towards the ballroom, where she was dancing with Chalmers.
"Maggie is very beautiful to-night," Naida said. "I could scarcely listen to my neighbour's conversation at dinner time for looking at her. Yet she has the air all the time of living in a dream, as though something had happened which had lifted her right away from us all. I began to wonder," she added, "whether, after all, Oscar Immelan had not told me the truth, and whether we should not be drinking her health and yours before the evening was over."
"You could scarcely believe that," he whispered, "if you have any memory at all."
There was a faint touch of pink in her cheeks, a tinge of colour as delicate as the passing of a gleam of sunshine over a sea-glistening shell.
"But Englishmen are so unfaithful," she sighed.
"Then I at least am an exception," Nigel answered swiftly. "The words which you checked upon my lips the last time we were alone together still live in my heart. I think, Naida, the time has come to say them."
Their immediate neighbours had deserted them. He leaned a little towards her.
"You know so well that I love you, Naida," he said. "Will you be my wife?"
She looked up at him, half laughing, yet with tears in her eyes. With an impulsive little gesture, she caught his hand in hers for a moment.
"How horribly sure you must have felt of me," she complained, "to have spoken here, with all these people around! Supposing I had told you that my life's work lay amongst my own people, or that I had made up my mind to marry Oscar Immelan, to console him for his great disappointment."
"I shouldn't have believed you," he answered, smiling.
"Conceit!" she exclaimed.
He shook his head.
"In a sense, of course, I am conceited," he replied. "I am the happiest and proudest man here. I really think that after all we ought to turn it into a celebration."
The band was playing a waltz. Naida's head moved to the music, and presently Nigel rose to his feet with a smile, and they passed into the ballroom. Karschoff and Mrs. Bollington Smith watched them with interest.
"Naida is looking very wonderful to-night," the latter remarked. "And Nigel, too; I wonder if there is anything between them."
"The days of foreign alliances are past," Karschoff replied, "but a few intermarriages might be very good for this country."
"Are you serious?" she asked.
"Absolutely! I would not suggest anything of the sort with Germany, but with this new Russia, the Russia of which Naida Karetsky is a daughter, why not? Although they will not have me back there, Russia is some day going to lay down the law to Europe."
"I wonder whether Maggie has any ideas of the sort in her mind," Mrs. Bollington Smith observed. "She seems curiously abstracted to-night."
Chalmers came grumblingly up to Mrs. Bollington Smith, with whom he was an established favourite.
"Lady Maggie is treating me disgracefully," he complained. "She will scarcely dance at all. She goes around talking to every one as though it were a sort of farewell party."
"Perhaps it may be," Karschoff remarked quietly.
"She isn't going away, is she?" Chalmers demanded.
"Who knows?" the Prince replied. "Lady Maggie is one of those strange people to whom one may look with every confidence for the unexpected."
She herself came across to them, a few moments later.
"Something tells me," she declared, "that you are talking about me."
"You are always a very much discussed young lady," Karschoff rejoined, with a little bow.
She made a grimace and sank into a chair by her aunt. She talked on lightly enough, but all the time with that slight suggestion of superficiality which is a sign of strain. She glanced often towards the entrance of the lounge, yet no one seemed less disturbed when at a few minutes before eleven Prince Shan came quietly in. He made his way at once to Mrs. Bollington Smith and bent over her fingers.
"It is so kind of you and Lord Dorminster," he said, "to give me this opportunity of saying good-by to a few friends."
"You are leaving us so soon, Prince?"
"To-morrow, soon after dawn," he replied, his eyes wandering around the little circle. "I wish to be in Pekin, if possible, by Wednesday, so myDragonmust spread his wings indeed."
He said a few words to almost everybody. Last of all he came to Maggie, and no one heard what he said to her. There was no change in his face as he bent low over her fingers, no sign of anything which might have passed between them, as a few minutes later he turned to one side with Nigel. Maggie held out her hand to Chalmers. The strain seemed to have passed. Her lips were parted in a wonderful smile, her feet moved to the music.
"Come and dance," she invited.
They moved a few steps away together, when Maggie came to an abrupt standstill. The two stood for a moment as though transfixed, their eyes upon the arched entrance which led from the restaurant into the lounge. A man was standing there, looking around, a strange, menacing figure, a man dressed in the garb of fashion but with the face of a savage, with eyes which burned in his head like twin dots of fire, with drawn, hollow cheeks and mouth a little open like a mad dog's. As his eyes fell upon the group and he recognised them, a look of horrible satisfaction came into his face. He began to approach quite deliberately. He seemed to take in by slow degrees every one who stood there,—Maggie herself and Chalmers, Naida, Nigel and Prince Shan. He moved forward. All the time his right hand was behind him, concealed underneath the tails of his dress coat.
"Be careful!" Maggie cried out. "It is Oscar Immelan! He is mad!"
Some of the party and many of the bystanders had shrunk away from the menacing figure. Naida stepped out from among the little group of those who were left.
"Oscar," she said firmly, "what is the matter with you? You are not well enough to be here."
He came to a standstill. At close quarters his appearance was even more terrible. Although by some means he had gotten into his evening clothes, he was only partly shaven, and there were gashes in his face where the hand which had held his razor had slipped. The pupils of his eyes were distended, and the eyes themselves seemed to have shrunk back into their sockets. His whole frame seemed to have suddenly lost vigour, even substance. He had the air of a man in clothes too large for him. Even his voice was shriller,—shriller and horrible with the slow and bestial satisfaction of his words.
"So here you are, the whole nest of you together, eh?" he exclaimed. "Good! Very good indeed! Prince Shan, the poisoner! Dorminster, enjoying your brief triumph, eh? And you, Naida Karetsky, traitress to your country—deceiver—"
"That will do, Immelan," Nigel interrupted sharply. "We are all here. What do you want with us?"
"That comes," Immelan replied. "Soon you shall all know why I have come! Let me speak to my friend Shan for a moment. I carry your poison in my veins, but there is a chance—just a chance," he added slowly, with a horrible smile upon his lips, "that you may go first, after all."
Nigel made a stealthy but rapid movement forward, drawing Naida gently out of the way. Immelan was too quick, however. He swung around, showing the revolver which he had been concealing behind him, and moved to one side until his back was against one of the pillars. By this time, most of the other occupants of the ballroom had either rushed screaming away altogether, or were hiding, peering out in fascinated horror from the different recesses. The chief maître d'hôtel bravely held his ground and came to within a few paces of Immelan.
"We can't have any brawling here," he said. "Put that revolver away."
Immelan took no notice of the intervener, except that for a single moment the muzzle yawned in the latter's face. The maître d'hôtel was a brave man, but he had a wife and family, and after all, it was not his affair. There were other men there to look after the ladies. He hurried off to call for the police. Almost as he went, Prince Shan stepped into the foreground. His voice was calm and expressionless. His eyes, in which there shone no shadow of fear, were steadily fixed upon Immelan. He spoke without flurry.
"So you carry your own weapons to-night, Immelan," he said. "That at least is more like a man. You seem to have a grievance against every one. Start with me. What is it?"
There were some of them who wondered why, at this juncture when he so clearly dominated his assailant, Prince Shan, whose courage was superb and whosesang froidabsolutely unshaken did not throw himself upon this intruder and take his chance of bringing the matter to an end at the moment when the man's nerve was undoubtedly shaken. Then they looked towards the entrance, and they understood. Creeping towards the little gathering came Li Wen and another of the Prince's suite, a younger and even more active man. The two came on tiptoe, crouching and moving warily, with the gleam of the tiger in their anxious eyes. Maggie caught a warning glance from Nigel and looked away.
"You are my murderer!" Immelan cried hoarsely. "It is through you I suffer these pains! I am dying of your accursed poison!"
"If that were true," Prince Shan replied, with the air of one willing to discuss the subject impartially, "might I remind you of Sen Lu, who died in my box at the Albert Hall? For whom was that dagger thrust meant, Immelan? Not for the man whom you had bought to betray me, the only one of my suite who has ever been tempted with gold. That dagger thrust was meant for me, and the assassin was one of your creatures. So even if your words were true, Immelan, and the poison which you imagine to be in your body were planted there by me, are we less than quits?"
Immelan's lie was unconvincing.
"I know nothing of Sen Lu's death," he declared. "I employ no assassins. When there is killing to be done, I can do it myself. I am here to-night for that purpose. You have deserted me at the last moment, Prince Shan—played me and my country false for the sake of the English woman whom you think to carry back with you to China. And you," he added, turning with a sudden furious glance at Naida, "you have deceived the man who trusted you, the man who sent you here for one purpose, and one purpose only. You have done your best to ruin my scheme. Not only that, but you have given the love which was mine—mine, I say—to another—an Englishman! I hate you all! That is why I, a dying man, have crawled here to reap my little harvest of vengeance.—You, Naida—you shall be first—"
Naida was suddenly swung on one side, and the shot which rang out passed through Nigel's coat sleeve, grazing his wrist,—the only shot that was fired. Prince Shan, watching for his moment, as his two attendants threw themselves upon the madman from behind, himself sprang forward, knocked Immelan's right hand up with a terrible blow, and sent the revolver crashing to the ground. It was a matter of a few seconds. Immelan, when he felt himself seized, scarcely struggled. The courage of his madness seemed to pass, the venom died out of his face, he shook like a man in an ague. Prince Shan kicked the revolver on one side and looked scornfully down upon him, now a nerveless wreck.
"Immelan," he said, "it is a pity that you did not wait until to-morrow morning. You would then have known the truth. You are no more poisoned than I am. If you had been in China—well, who knows? In England there is so much prejudice against the taking of a worthless life that as a guest I subscribed to it and mixed a little orris-root tooth powder with your vermouth."
The man's eyes suddenly opened. He was feverishly, frantically anxious.
"Tell me that again," he shrieked. "You mean it? Swear that you mean it."
Prince Shan's gesture as he turned away was one of supreme contempt.
"A Shan," he said, "never needs to repeat."
There was the bustle of arriving police, the story of a revolver which had gone off by accident, a very puzzling contretemps expounded for their benefit. The situation, and the participants in it, seemed to dissolve with such facility that it was hard for any one to understand what had actually happened. Prince Shan, with Maggie on his arm, was talking to the leader of the orchestra, who had suddenly reappeared. The former turned to his companion.
"It is not my custom to dance," he said, "but the waltz that they were beginning to play seemed to me to have a little of the lure of our own music. Will you do me the honour?"
They moved away to the music. Chalmers stood and watched them, with one hand in his pocket and the other on Nigel's shoulder. He turned to Naida, who was on the other side.
"Nothing like a touch of melodrama for the emotions," he grumbled. "Look at Lady Maggie! Her head might be touching the clouds, and I never saw her eyes shine like that when she danced with me."
"You don't dance as well as Prince Shan, old fellow," Nigel told him.
"And the Prince sails for China at dawn," Naida murmured.